Les Misérables, v. 4/5: The Idyll and the Epic

  CHAPTER I.

  THE FLAG: ACT FIRST.

  Nothing came yet: it had struck ten by St. Merry's, and Enjolras andCombeferre were sitting musket in hand near the sally-port of the greatbarricade. They did not speak, but were listening, trying to catch thedullest and most remote sound of marching. Suddenly, in the midst ofthis lugubrious calm, a clear, young, gay voice, which seemed to comefrom the Rue St. Denis, burst forth, and began singing distinctly, tothe old popular tune of "Au clair de la lune," these lines, terminatingwith a cry that resembled a cock-crow:--

  "Mon nez est en larmes, Mon ami Bugeaud, Prêt'-moi tes gendarmes Pour leur dire un mot. En capote bleue, La poule au shako, Voici la banlieue! Co-cocorico!"

  They shook hands.

  "'T is Gavroche," said Enjolras.

  "He is warning us," said Combeferre.

  Hurried footsteps troubled the deserted streets, and a being moreactive than a clown was seen climbing over the omnibus, and Gavrocheleaped into the square, out of breath, and saying,--

  "My gun! Here they are!"

  An electric shudder ran along the whole barricade, and the movement ofhands seeking guns was heard.

  "Will you have my carbine?" Enjolras asked the gamin.

  "I want the big gun," Gavroche answered, and took Javert's musket.

  Two sentries had fallen back and come in almost simultaneously withGavroche; they were those from the end of the street and the PetiteTruanderie. The vedette in the Lane des Prêcheurs remained at hispost, which indicated that nothing was coming from the direction ofthe bridges and the markets. The Rue de la Chanvrerie, in which a fewpaving-stones were scarce visible in the reflection of the light caston the flag, offered to the insurgents the aspect of a large blackgate vaguely opened in a cloud of smoke. Every man proceeded to hispost: forty-three insurgents, among whom were Enjolras, Combeferre,Courfeyrac, Bossuet, Joly, Bahorel, and Gavroche, knelt behind thegreat barricade, with the muzzles of their guns and carbines thrust outbetween the paving-stones as through loop-holes, attentive, silent,and ready to fire. Six, commanded by Feuilly, installed themselvesat the upper windows of Corinth. Some minutes more elapsed, andthen a measured, heavy tramp of many feet was distinctly heard fromthe direction of St. Leu; this noise, at first faint, then precise,and then heavy and re-echoing, approached slowly, without halt orinterruption, and with a tranquil and terrible continuity. Nothing wasaudible but this; it was at once the silence and noise of the statuteof the commendatore, but the stormy footfall had something enormousand multiple about it, which aroused the idea of a multitude at thesame time as that of a spectre; you might have fancied that you heardthe fearful statue Legion on the march. The tramp came nearer, nearerstill, and then ceased; and the breathing of many men seemed to beaudible at the end of the street. Nothing, however, was visible, thoughquite at the end in the thick gloom could be distinguished a multitudeof metallic threads, fine as needles and almost imperceptible, whichmoved about like that indescribable phosphoric network which weperceive under our closed eyelids just at the moment when we arefalling asleep. These were bayonets and musket-barrels on which thereflection of the torch confusedly fell. There was another pause, asif both sides were waiting. All at once a voice which was the moresinister because no one could be seen, and it seemed as if the darknessitself was speaking, shouted, "Who goes there?"

  At the same time the click of muskets being cocked could be heard.Enjolras replied with a sonorous and haughty accent,--

  "French Revolution!"

  "Fire!" the voice commanded.

  A flash lit up all the frontages in the street, as if the door of afurnace had been suddenly opened and shut, and a frightful shower ofbullets hurled against the barricade, and the flag fell. The dischargehad been so violent and dense that it cut the staff asunder, that is tosay, the extreme point of the omnibus pole. Bullets ricochetting fromthe corners of the houses penetrated the barricade and wounded severalmen. The impression produced by this first discharge was chilling; theattack was rude, and of a nature to make the boldest think. It wasplain that they had to do with a whole regiment at the least.

  "Comrades," Courfeyrac cried, "let us not waste our powder, but waittill they have entered the street before returning their fire."

  "And before all," Enjolras said, "let us hoist the flag again!"

  He picked up the flag, which had fallen at his feet: outside, thering of ramrods in barrels could be heard; the troops were reloading.Enjolras continued,--

  "Who has a brave heart among us? Who will plant the flag on thebarricade again?"

  Not one replied; for to mount the barricade at this moment, when allthe guns were doubtless again aimed at it, was simply death, and thebravest man hesitates to condemn himself. Enjolras even shuddered as herepeated,--

  "Will no one offer?"