se
leaders, and no certain fact can invalidate the singular arrogance of
this reply made later on by a man accused before the Court of Peers:--

"Who was your leader?"

"I knew of none and I recognized none."

There was nothing but words, transparent but vague; sometimes idle
reports, rumors, hearsay. Other indications cropped up.

A carpenter, occupied in nailing boards to a fence around the ground
on which a house was in process of construction, in the Rue de Reuilly
found on that plot the torn fragment of a letter on which were still
legible the following lines:--

The committee must take measures to prevent recruiting in the sections
for the different societies.

And, as a postscript:--

We have learned that there are guns in the Rue du Faubourg-Poissonniere,
No. 5 [bis], to the number of five or six thousand, in the house of a
gunsmith in that court. The section owns no arms.

What excited the carpenter and caused him to show this thing to his
neighbors was the fact, that a few paces further on he picked up another
paper, torn like the first, and still more significant, of which we
reproduce a facsimile, because of the historical interest attaching to
these strange documents:--

[Illustration: Code Table 4b1-5 page 26]

+------------------------------------------------------------+
| Q | C | D | E | Learn this list by heart. After so doing
| | | | | | you will tear it up. The men admitted
| | | | | | will do the same when you have transmitted
| | | | | | their orders to them.
| | | | | | Health and Fraternity,
| | | | | | u og a fe L. |
+------------------------------------------------------------+

It was only later on that the persons who were in the secret of this
find at the time, learned the significance of those four capital
letters: quinturions, centurions, decurions, eclaireurs [scouts], and
the sense of the letters: u og a fe, which was a date, and meant April
15th, 1832. Under each capital letter were inscribed names followed by
very characteristic notes. Thus: Q. Bannerel. 8 guns, 83 cartridges. A
safe man.--C. Boubiere. 1 pistol, 40 cartridges.--D. Rollet. 1 foil,
1 pistol, 1 pound of powder.--E. Tessier. 1 sword, 1 cartridge-box.
Exact.--Terreur. 8 guns. Brave, etc.

Finally, this carpenter found, still in the same enclosure, a third
paper on which was written in pencil, but very legibly, this sort of
enigmatical list:--

Unite: Blanchard: Arbre-Sec. 6.