Page 1785 - les-miserables

CHAPTER IV

THE EBULLITIONS

OF FORMER DAYS

Nothing is more extraordinary than the first breaking out
of a riot. Everything bursts forth everywhere at once. Was it
foreseen? Yes. Was it prepared? No. Whence comes it? From
the pavements. Whence falls it? From the clouds. Here
insurrection assumes the character of a plot; there of an im-
provisation. The first comer seizes a current of the throng
and leads it whither he wills. A beginning full of terror, in
which is mingled a sort of formidable gayety. First come
clamors, the shops are closed, the displays of the merchants
disappear; then come isolated shots; people flee; blows from
gun-stocks beat against portes cocheres, servants can be
heard laughing in the courtyards of houses and saying:
‘There’s going to be a row!’
A quarter of an hour had not elapsed when this is what
was taking place at twenty different spots in Paris at once.
In the Rue Sainte-Croix-de-la-Bretonnerie, twenty young
men, bearded and with long hair, entered a dram-shop and
emerged a moment later, carrying a horizontal tricolored

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