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| 1 | 171 | 343 | 514 | 685 |
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We may add, what is not a contradiction, that at the same time the
garrison at Mazas was being increased. 1200 more men were marched in,
in detachments of 100 men each, spacing out their arrivals in "little
doses" as an eye-witness remarked to us. Later on 400 men. 100 litres
of brandy were distributed to them. One litre for every sixteen men.
The prisoners could hear the movement of artillery round the prison.
The agitation spread to the most peaceable quarters. But the centre of
Paris was above all threatening. The centre of Paris is a labyrinth of
streets which appears to be made for the labyrinth of riots. The Ligue,
the Fronde, the Revolution--we must unceasingly recall these useful
facts--the 14th of July, the 10th of August, 1792, 1830, 1848, have
come out from thence. These brave old streets were awakened. At eleven
o'clock in the morning from Notre Dame to the Porte Saint Martin there
were seventy-seven barricades. Three of them, one in the Rue Maubuée,
another in the Rue Bertin-Poirée, another in the Rue Guérin-Boisseau,
attained the height of the second stories; the barricade of the Porte
Saint Denis was almost as bristling and as formidable as the barrier of
the Faubourg Saint Antoine in June, 1848. The handful of the
Representatives of the People had swooped down like a shower of sparks
on these famous and inflammable crossroads. The beginning of the fire.
The fire had caught. The old central market quarter, that city which is
contained in the city, shouted, "Down with Bonaparte!" They hooted the
police, they hissed the troops. Some regiments seemed stupefied. They
cried, "Throw up your butt ends in the air!" From the windows above,
women encouraged the construction of the barricades. There was powder
there, there were muskets. Now, we were no longer alone. We saw rising
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