mbell ring its loudest;--and, on the whole, Forward, ye
Hundred and forty-four; retreat is now none for you!

Reader, fancy not, in thy languid way, that Insurrection is easy.
Insurrection is difficult: each individual uncertain even of his next
neighbour; totally uncertain of his distant neighbours, what strength
is with him, what strength is against him; certain only that, in case of
failure, his individual portion is the gallows! Eight hundred thousand
heads, and in each of them a separate estimate of these uncertainties,
a separate theorem of action conformable to that: out of so many
uncertainties, does the certainty, and inevitable net-result never to
be abolished, go on, at all moments, bodying itself forth;--leading thee
also towards civic-crowns or an ignominious noose.

Could the Reader take an Asmodeus's Flight, and waving open all roofs
and privacies, look down from the Tower of Notre Dame, what a Paris were
it! Of treble-voice whimperings or vehemence, of bass-voice growlings,
dubitations; Courage screwing itself to desperate defiance; Cowardice
trembling silent within barred doors;--and all round, Dulness calmly
snoring; for much Dulness, flung on its mattresses, always sleeps. O,
between the clangour of these high-storming tocsins and that snore of
Dulness, what a gamut: of trepidation, excitation, desperation; and
above it mere Doubt, Danger, Atropos and Nox!

Fighters of this section draw out; hear that the next Section does
not; and thereupon draw in. Saint-Antoine, on this side the River, is
uncertain of Saint-Marceau on that. Steady only is the snore of Dulness,
are the Six Hundred Marseillese that know how to die! Mandat, twice
summoned to the Townhall, has not come. Scouts fly incessant, in
distracted haste; and the many-whispering voices of Rumour. Theroigne
and unofficial Patriots flit, dim-visible, exploratory, far and wide;
like Night-birds on the wing. Of Nationals some Three thousand have
followed Mandat and his generale; the rest follow each his own theorem
of the uncertainties: theorem, that one should march rather with
Saint-Antoine; innumerable theorems, that in such a case the wholesomest
were sleep. And so the drums beat, in made fits, and the stormbells
peal. Saint-Antoine itself does but draw out and draw in; Commandant
Santerre, over there, cannot believe that the Marseillese and Saint
Marceau will march. Thou laggard sonorous Beer-vat, with the loud voice
and timber head, is it ti