on up the Boulevard,
reconnoitering every spot.

At the Rue du Faubourg Montmartre they were stopped by a barricade,
which was rapidly rising under the united and vigorous exertions of
several hundred men. Steadily, sternly and silently, all that night they
toiled, and when the barricade was completed the tri-color flag was
planted on its summit, and a citizen-soldier stood beside its staff to
defend it. On the other side of the Boulevard, in the Rue Montmartre,
rose another barricade entirely finished.

"These men are resolved," said Louis Blanc.

"Desperate, rather," replied Albert. "They have counted the cost and
prepared to go on with the attempt they have begun at all hazards. It is
better to fight than starve, they think."

"But do you observe how few of them are armed?" asked Louis Blanc.

"We have provided for that deficiency. You will see arms enough for all
to-morrow," replied Albert. "Barricades first, arms afterwards!"

And, indeed, while he was yet speaking, a tumbrel loaded with arms of
every description drove silently up, and each man supplied himself with
a weapon that suited his fancy. In some instances the taste exhibited
was ludicrous in the extreme; there were swords without scabbards and
bayonets without guns--a towering helmet on the head of one man, and
broad white leather cross-belts on the shoulders of another--daggers and
knives, sabres and pikes mingled in grotesque confusion. But each
individual was armed with something, and, to crown all, a small piece of
ordnance, borne on the shoulders of four stout men, who staggered
beneath its weight, was now brought up and placed in battery.

"From such men what may we not hope!" exclaimed Louis Blanc. "But it is
near morning; let us proceed."

"I stop here," quietly said Albert.

"What! Pass the night here?" exclaimed his companion.

"The night is nearly passed now," replied Albert, with a smile. "I will
sleep a few hours with my men of the barricades, and be ready to help
them defend their work in the morning."

"You are devoted to the cause, Albert," said Louis Blanc, warmly
grasping his hand.

"Oh! no more than yourself," was the reply. "We are all devoted to it,
but each in his own way. You are an author, I am a workman. It is a
light thing for me to pass a night with only the sky for a canopy. It
is a light thing for you to pass a night in your study. A change of
positions would possibly kill us both!"

The friends grasped each o