s in one corner, kisses
in another, and the reader will have some idea of this whole picture,
over which flickered the light of a great, flaming fire, which made a
thousand huge and grotesque shadows dance over the walls of the drinking
shop.

* A game played on a checker-board containing three concentric
sets of squares, with small stones. The game consisted in getting three
stones in a row.

As for the noise, it was like the inside of a bell at full peal.

The dripping-pan, where crackled a rain of grease, filled with its
continual sputtering the intervals of these thousand dialogues, which
intermingled from one end of the apartment to the other.

In the midst of this uproar, at the extremity of the tavern, on the
bench inside the chimney, sat a philosopher meditating with his feet in
the ashes and his eyes on the brands. It was Pierre Gringoire.

"Be quick! make haste, arm yourselves! we set out on the march in an
hour!" said Clopin Trouillefou to his thieves.

A wench was humming,--

"_Bonsoir mon pere et ma mere,
Les derniers couvrent le feu_."*

* Good night, father and mother, the last cover up the fire.

Two card players were disputing,--

"Knave!" cried the reddest faced of the two, shaking his fist at the
other; "I'll mark you with the club. You can take the place of Mistigri
in the pack of cards of monseigneur the king."

"Ugh!" roared a Norman, recognizable by his nasal accent; "we are packed
in here like the saints of Caillouville!"

"My sons," the Duke of Egypt was saying to his audience, in a falsetto
voice, "sorceresses in France go to the witches' sabbath without
broomsticks, or grease, or steed, merely by means of some magic words.
The witches of Italy always have a buck waiting for them at their door.
All are bound to go out through the chimney."

The voice of the young scamp armed from head to foot, dominated the
uproar.

"Hurrah! hurrah!" he was shouting. "My first day in armor! Outcast! I
am an outcast. Give me something to drink. My friends, my name is Jehan
Frollo du Moulin, and I am a gentleman. My opinion is that if God were a
_gendarme_, he would turn robber. Brothers, we are about to set out on
a fine expedition. Lay siege to the church, burst in the doors, drag out
the beautiful girl, save her from the judges, save her from the priests,
dismantle the cloister, burn the bishop in his palace--all this we will
do in less time than it takes