t good reason I have not to
drink, and how excellently spoke Saint-Benoit: '_Vinum apostatare facit
etiam sapientes!_'"

At that moment, Clopin returned and shouted in a voice of thunder:
"Midnight!"

At this word, which produced the effect of the call to boot and saddle
on a regiment at a halt, all the outcasts, men, women, children,
rushed in a mass from the tavern, with great noise of arms and old iron
implements.

The moon was obscured.

The Cour des Miracles was entirely dark. There was not a single light.
One could make out there a throng of men and women conversing in low
tones. They could be heard buzzing, and a gleam of all sorts of weapons
was visible in the darkness. Clopin mounted a large stone.

"To your ranks, Argot!"* he cried. "Fall into line, Egypt! Form ranks,
Galilee!"

* Men of the brotherhood of slang: thieves.

A movement began in the darkness. The immense multitude appeared to form
in a column. After a few minutes, the King of Thunes raised his voice
once more,--

"Now, silence to march through Paris! The password is, 'Little sword
in pocket!' The torches will not be lighted till we reach Notre-Dame!
Forward, march!"

Ten minutes later, the cavaliers of the watch fled in terror before a
long procession of black and silent men which was descending towards
the Pont an Change, through the tortuous streets which pierce the
close-built neighborhood of the markets in every direction.

CHAPTER IV. AN AWKWARD FRIEND.

That night, Quasimodo did not sleep. He had just made his last round of
the church. He had not noticed, that at the moment when he was closing
the doors, the archdeacon had passed close to him and betrayed some
displeasure on seeing him bolting and barring with care the enormous
iron locks which gave to their large leaves the solidity of a wall. Dom
Claude's air was even more preoccupied than usual. Moreover, since the
nocturnal adventure in the cell, he had constantly abused Quasimodo,
but in vain did he ill treat, and even beat him occasionally, nothing
disturbed the submission, patience, the devoted resignation of
the faithful bellringer. He endured everything on the part of the
archdeacon, insults, threats, blows, without murmuring a complaint. At
the most, he gazed uneasily after Dom Claude when the latter ascended
the staircase of the tower; but the archdeacon had abstained from
presenting himself again before the gypsy's eyes.

On that night, accor