the Rue Vivienne a man was stopping before a placard and was trying to
deface it or to tear it down. I drew near this man, who probably took me
for a police agent, and who fled at the top of his speed. I retraced my
steps. Near the Colbert Arcade, and just as I reached the point in the
street where they post the theatrical bills, a workman passed me, and
said quickly, "What is Joseph doing?"

I recognized the last-maker.

"Come," he said to me.

We set out without speaking and without appearing to know each other, he
walking some steps before me.

We first went to two addresses, which I cannot mention here without
pointing out victims for the proscription. In these two houses we got no
news; no one had come there on the part of the societies.

"Let us go to the third place," said the last-maker, and he explained to
me that they had settled among them three successive meeting-places, in
case of need, so as to be always sure of finding each other if,
perchance, the police discovered the first or even the second
meeting-place, a precaution which for our part we adopted as much as
possible with regard to our meetings of the Left end of the Committee.

We had reached the market quarter. Fighting had been going on there
throughout the day. There were no longer any gas-lamps in the streets.
We stopped from time to time, and listened so as not to run headlong
into the arms of a patrol. We got over a paling of planks almost
completely destroyed, and of which barricades had probably been made,
and we crossed the extensive area of half-demolished houses which at
that epoch encumbered the lower portions of the Rue Montmartre and Rue
Montorgueil. On the peaks of the high dismantled gables could be seen a
flickering red glow, doubtless the reflection of the bivouac-fires of the
soldiers encamped in the markets and in the neighborhood of Saint
Eustache. This reflection lighted our way. The last-maker, however,
narrowly escaped falling into a deep hole, which was no less than the
cellar of a demolished house. On coming out of this region, covered with
ruins, amongst which here and there a few trees might be perceived, the
remains of gardens which had now disappeared, we entered into narrow,
winding, and completely dark streets, where it was impossible to
recognize one's whereabouts. Nevertheless the last-maker walked on as
much at his ease as in broad daylight, and like a man who is going
straight to his destination. Once he turn