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It was the look which conquered.
This man no longer hesitated. He entered gloomily into the enterprise.
From twelve to two o'clock there was in this enormous city given over
to the unknown an indescribable and fierce expectation. All was calm
and awe-striking. The regiments and the limbered batteries quitted the
faubourg and stationed themselves noiselessly around the boulevards.
Not a cry in the ranks of the soldiery. An eye-witness said, "The
soldiers march with quite a jaunty air." On the Quai de la Ferronnerie,
heaped up with regiments ever since the morning of the 2d of December,
there now only remained a post of Municipal Guards. Everything ebbed
back to the centre, the people as well as the army; the silence of the
army had ultimately spread to the people. They watched each other.
Each soldier had three days' provisions and six packets of cartridges.
It has since transpired that at this moment 10,000 francs were daily
spent in brandy for each brigade.
Towards one o'clock, Magnan went to the Hôtel de Ville, had the reserve
limbered under his own eyes, and did not leave until all the batteries
were ready to march.
Certain suspicious preparations grew more numerous. Towards noon the
State workmen and the hospital corps had established a species of huge
ambulance at No. 2, Faubourg Montmartre. A great heap of litters was
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