CHAPTER V.
PREPARATIONS.
The journals of the day which stated that the barricade in the Ruede la Chanvrerie, that "almost impregnable fortress," as they calledit, reached the level of a first-floor, are mistaken, for the truthis that it did not exceed an average height of six or seven feet.It was so built that the combatants could at will either disappearbehind it or ascend to its crest by means of a quadruple row ofpaving-stones arranged like steps inside. Externally the front ofthe barricade, composed of piles of paving-stones and barrels, heldtogether by joists and planks passed through the wheels of the truckand the omnibus, had a bristling and inextricable appearance. A gap,sufficiently wide for one man to pass, was left between the house-walland the end of the barricade farthest from the wine-shop, so thata sortie was possible. The pole of the omnibus was held upright byropes, and a red flag fixed to this pole floated over the barricade.The small Mondétour barricade, concealed behind the wine-shop, couldnot be seen, but the two barricades combined formed a real redoubt.Enjolras and Courfeyrac had not thought it advisable to barricade theother portion of the Rue Mondétour, which opens on to the Halles, asthey doubtless wished to maintain a possible communication with theoutside, and had but little fear of being attacked by the difficultand dangerous Rue des Prêcheurs. With the exception of this issue leftfree, which constituted what Folard would have called in a strategicstyle a _boyau_, and of the narrow passage in the Rue de la Chanvrerie,the interior of the barricade, in which the wine-shop formed a salientangle, presented an irregular quadrilateral enclosed on all sides.There was a space of twenty yards between the great barricade and thetall houses which formed the end of the street, so that it might besaid that the barricade leaned against these houses, which were allinhabited, but closed from top to bottom.
All this labor was completed without any obstacle, in less thanan hour, during which this handful of men had not seen a singlebearskin-cap or bayonet. The few citizens who still ventured at thismoment of riot into the Rue St. Denis took a glance into the Ruede la Chanvrerie, perceived the barricade, and doubled their pace.When the two barricades were completed and the flag was hoisted, atable was pulled from the wine-shop into the street, and Courfeyracgot upon it. Enjolras brought up the square chest, which Courfeyracopened, and it proved to be full of cartridges. When they saw thesecartridges the bravest trembled, and there was a moment's silence.Courfeyrac distributed the cartridges smilingly, and each receivedthirty: many had powder, and began making others with the bullets whichhad been cast; as for the powder barrel, it was on a separate table,near the door, and was held in reserve. The drum-beat call to arms,which was traversing the whole of Paris, did not cease, but in the endit had become a monotonous sound, to which they no longer paid anyattention. This noise at one moment retired, at another came nearer,with lugubrious undulations. The guns and carbines were loaded alltogether, without precipitation and with a solemn gravity. Enjolrasthen stationed three sentries outside the barricades, one in the Rue dela Chanvrerie, the second in the Rue des Prêcheurs, the third at thecorner of the Petite Truanderie. Then, when the barricades were built,the posts assigned, the guns loaded, the sentries set, the insurgentsalone in these formidable streets, through which no one now passed,surrounded by dumb and, as it were, dead houses, in which no humanmovement palpitated, enveloped in the menacing darkness, in the midstof that silence and obscurity in which they felt something advancing,and which had something tragical and terrifying about it, isolated,armed, determined, and tranquil--waited.