Page 1432 - les-miserables

more than ten minutes. Significant remarks were exchanged
in a low tone: ‘The plot is ripe, the matter is arranged.’ ‘It
was murmured by all who were there,’ to borrow the very
expression of one of those who were present. The exaltation
was such that one day, a workingman exclaimed, before the
whole wine-shop: ‘We have no arms!’ One of his comrades
replied: ‘The soldiers have!’ thus parodying without being
aware of the fact, Bonaparte’s proclamation to the army in
Italy: ‘When they had anything of a more secret nature on
hand,’ adds one report, ‘they did not communicate it to each
other.’ It is not easy to understand what they could conceal
after what they said.
These reunions were sometimes periodical. At certain
ones of them, there were never more than eight or ten per-
sons present, and they were always the same. In others, any
one entered who wished, and the room was so full that they
were forced to stand. Some went thither through enthusi-
asm and passion; others because it was on their way to their
work. As during the Revolution, there were patriotic women
in some of these wine-shops who embraced new-comers.
Other expressive facts came to light.
A man would enter a shop, drink, and go his way with
the remark: ‘Wine-merchant, the revolution will pay what
is due to you.’
Revolutionary agents were appointed in a wine-shop fac-
ing the Rue de Charonne. The balloting was carried on in
their caps.
Workingmen met at the house of a fencing-master who
gave lessons in the Rue de Cotte. There there was a trophy

1432 Les Miserables