without great difficulty that he climbed the stone steps, and
when he reached the level ground of the _quai_ at the summit he walked
very slowly, supported by his companion's arm, with the shuffling gait
of a somnambulist. The day had not dawned yet, but the reflected light
from the burning buildings cast a lurid illumination on the wide Place.
They made their way in silence across its deep solitude, sick at heart
to behold the mournful scene of devastation it presented. At either
extremity, beyond the bridge and at the further end of the Rue Royale,
they could faintly discern the shadowy outlines of the Palais Bourbon
and the Church of the Madeleine, torn by shot and shell. The terrace of
the Tuileries had been breached by the fire of the siege guns and
was partially in ruins. On the Place itself the bronze railings and
ornaments of the fountains had been chipped and defaced by the
balls; the colossal statue of Lille lay on the ground shattered by a
projectile, while near at hand the statue of Strasbourg, shrouded in
heavy veils of crape, seemed to be mourning the ruin that surrounded
it on every side. And near the Obelisk, which had escaped unscathed,
a gas-pipe in its trench had been broken by the pick of a careless
workman, and the escaping gas, fired by some accident, was flaring up in
a great undulating jet, with a roaring, hissing sound.

Jean gave a wide berth to the barricade erected across the Rue Royale
between the Ministry of Marine and the Garde-Meuble, both of which the
fire had spared; he could hear the voices of the soldiers behind the
sand bags and casks of earth with which it was constructed. Its front
was protected by a ditch, filled with stagnant, greenish water, in
which was floating the dead body of a federate, and through one of
its embrasures they caught a glimpse of the houses in the carrefour
Saint-Honore, which were burning still in spite of the engines that had
come in from the suburbs, of which they heard the roar and clatter. To
right and left the trees and the kiosks of the newspaper venders were
riddled by the storm of bullets to which they had been subjected. Loud
cries of horror arose; the firemen, in exploring the cellar of one of
the burning houses, had come across the charred bodies of seven of its
inmates.

Although the barricade that closed the entrance to the Rue
Saint-Florentin and the Rue de Rivoli by its skilled construction
and great height appeared even more formidable than