Page 2038 - les-miserables

troops broke in the doors of houses whence shots had been
fired; at the same time, manoeuvres by the cavalry dis-
persed the groups on the boulevards. This repression was
not effected without some commotion, and without that tu-
multuous uproar peculiar to collisions between the army
and the people. This was what Enjolras had caught in the
intervals of the cannonade and the musketry. Moreover, he
had seen wounded men passing the end of the street in lit-
ters, and he said to Courfeyrac:—‘Those wounded do not
come from us.’
Their hope did not last long; the gleam was quickly
eclipsed. In less than half an hour, what was in the air van-
ished, it was a flash of lightning unaccompanied by thunder,
and the insurgents felt that sort of leaden cope, which the
indifference of the people casts over obstinate and deserted
men, fall over them once more.
The general movement, which seemed to have assumed
a vague outline, had miscarried; and the attention of the
minister of war and the strategy of the generals could now
be concentrated on the three or four barricades which still
remained standing.
The sun was mounting above the horizon.
An insurgent hailed Enjolras.
‘We are hungry here. Are we really going to die like this,
without anything to eat?’
Enjolras, who was still leaning on his elbows at his em-
brasure, made an affirmative sign with his head, but without
taking his eyes from the end of the street.

2038 Les Miserables