adside, composed of a quadruple howl.

"Here's another rascal."

"What's that he's got in his paddle? A pistol?"

"Well, I'd like to know what sort of a beggar's brat this is?"

"That sort of animal is never easy unless he's overturning the
authorities."

Gavroche disdainfully contented himself, by way of reprisal, with
elevating the tip of his nose with his thumb and opening his hand wide.

The rag-picker cried:--

"You malicious, bare-pawed little wretch!"

The one who answered to the name of Patagon clapped her hands together
in horror.

"There's going to be evil doings, that's certain. The errand-boy next
door has a little pointed beard, I have seen him pass every day with a
young person in a pink bonnet on his arm; to-day I saw him pass, and
he had a gun on his arm. Mame Bacheux says, that last week there was a
revolution at--at--at--where's the calf!--at Pontoise. And then, there
you see him, that horrid scamp, with his pistol! It seems that the
Celestins are full of pistols. What do you suppose the Government can
do with good-for-nothings who don't know how to do anything but contrive
ways of upsetting the world, when we had just begun to get a little
quiet after all the misfortunes that have happened, good Lord! to that
poor queen whom I saw pass in the tumbril! And all this is going to
make tobacco dearer. It's infamous! And I shall certainly go to see him
beheaded on the guillotine, the wretch!"

"You've got the sniffles, old lady," said Gavroche. "Blow your
promontory."

And he passed on. When he was in the Rue Pavee, the rag-picker occurred
to his mind, and he indulged in this soliloquy:--

"You're in the wrong to insult the revolutionists, Mother
Dust-Heap-Corner. This pistol is in your interests. It's so that you may
have more good things to eat in your basket."

All at once, he heard a shout behind him; it was the portress Patagon
who had followed him, and who was shaking her fist at him in the
distance and crying:--

"You're nothing but a bastard."

"Oh! Come now," said Gavroche, "I don't care a brass farthing for that!"

Shortly afterwards, he passed the Hotel Lamoignon. There he uttered this
appeal:--

"Forward march to the battle!"

And he was seized with a fit of melancholy. He gazed at his pistol with
an air of reproach which seemed an attempt to appease it:--

"I'm going off," said he, "but you won't go off!"

One dog may distract the attention from another dog.[45] A very