one. I don't know
whether I was in at the beginning of the altercation, or if it had been
led up to in any way, but what I heard and saw was this. "Tu es juif,
n'est ce pas?" said the big man, with a sort of bullying jocundity.
"Mais oui, monsieur," the little man assented. "Ah!" said the other,
"you wear your nose too long for your face." With that simple but
sufficing explanation, the big man hit the little man on the obnoxious
feature and felled him to the pavement. There was a bit of a student
rush at that moment, and the crowd went over the prostrate figure, but
a detachment of the _gardes de ville_ which happened to be near at hand,
went in and rescued him, and he was borne away all muddy and tattered
and bleeding.

The sport of Jew-baiting went on quite merrily all over Paris at this
time, and on the Place Bouge, on the Sunday afternoon on which M. Henri
Rochefort elected to surrender himself to the prison authorities, there
was at least a score of merry little chases in which a hundred or so of
whooping and roaring citizens would pursue some member of the unpopular
race until he found refuge amongst the soldiery or the police, when he
was hustled on to take his chance amidst another portion of the crowd.
There was more horse-play than anger in all this, and cases in which
serious mischief was inflicted were rare. But the mob was in a highly
explosive state for all that, and any sturdy attempt at resistance or
self-defence might at any moment have led to bloodshed.

The surrender of M. Rochefort was really, when all things are
considered, one of the drollest spectacles I have ever seen. That
venerable political firebrand had been adjudged guilty of contempt
of court and had been sentenced to seven days' imprisonment as a
first-class misdemeanant. He was mulct in some inconsiderable fine as
well, and he was allowed to suit his own convenience and fancy as to the
time and manner of surrender. He chose to present himself to his gaolers
on a Sunday, and to arrive in an open carriage at the head of a small
procession. All Paris turned out to see him. There were fifteen thousand
troops along the line of route, and fifty thousand more of all arms
quartered near at hand. Why there should have been any necessity for the
collection of such a force, or for the provocation of a possible riot
under the conditions, it was difficult to see. The crowd groaned and
cheered with tremendous enthusiasm, and when at last somebody wav