sash will be
there."

He was anxious that this sash should do its duty. He determined in the
depths of his great soul that this sash should triumph either through
the law or through death.

That is to say, in the first case it would save Right, in the second
save Honor.

Dying, he could say, "I have succeeded."

Of the two possible triumphs of which he had dreamed, the gloomy triumph
was not the less splendid.

The insurgent of the Elysee thought that he had killed a Representative
of the People, and boasted of it. The sole journal published by the
_coup d'etat_ under these different titles _Patrie_, _Univers_,
_Moniteur_, _Parisien_, etc., announced on the next day, Friday, the
5th, "that the ex-Representative Dussoubs (Gaston) had been killed at
the barricade of the Rue Neuve Saint Eustache, and that he bore 'a red
flag in his hand.'"

CHAPTER IV.

WHAT WAS DONE DURING THE NIGHT--THE PASSAGE DU SAUMON

When those on the barricade of the Petit Carreau saw Dussoubs fall, so
gloriously for his friends, so shamefully for his murderers, a moment of
stupor ensued. Was it possible? Did they really see this before them?
Such a crime committed by our soldiers? Horror filled every soul.

This moment of surprise did not last long. "Long live the Republic!"
shouted the barricade with one voice, and it replied to the ambuscade by
a formidable fire.

The conflict began. A mad conflict on the part of the _coup d'etat_, a
struggle of despair on the side of the Republic. On the side of the
soldiers an appalling and cold blooded resolution, a passive and
ferocious obedience, numbers, good arms, absolute chiefs, pouches filled
with cartridges. On the side of the People no ammunition, disorder,
weariness, exhaustion, no discipline, indignation serving for a leader.

It appears that while Dussoubs was speaking, fifteen grenadiers,
commanded by a sergeant named Pitrois, had succeeded in gliding in the
darkness along the houses, and, unperceived and unheard, had taken up
their position close to the barricade. These fifteen men suddenly formed
themselves together with lowered bayonets at twenty paces from the
barricade ready to scale it. A volley received them. They fell back,
leaving several corpses in the gutter. Major Jeannin cried out, "Finish
them off." The entire battalion which occupied the Mauconseil barricade,
then appeared with raised bayonets upon the uneven crest of this
barricade, and from there without br