completed, a score or more of men entered
the Gymnase Theatre by the stage-door, and came out a few seconds later
with some muskets and a drum which they had found in the wardrobe, and
which were a part of what, in theatrical language, are termed 'the
properties,' One of the men took the drum and began beating to arms.
The others, with the overturned vespasian columns, carriages thrown
on their sides, blinds and shutters torn from their hinges, and old
scenery, constructed, opposite the guard-house of Boulevard
Bonne-Nouvelle, a small barricade as a sort of advanced post, or rather
a lunette, which commanded Boulevards Poissonniere and Montmartre as
well as Rue Hauteville. The troops had evacuated the guard-house in the
morning. They took the flag belonging to it and planted it on the
barricade. It was this same flag which was afterwards declared by the
newspapers of the _coup d'etat_ to have been a 'red flag.'

"Some fifteen men took up their position at this advanced post. They
had muskets, but no cartridges, or, at most, very few. Behind them, the
large barricade, which covered Porte Saint-Denis, was held by about a
hundred combatants, in the midst of whom were observed two women and an
old man with white hair, supporting himself on a cane with his left
hand, and, in his right, holding a musket. One of the two women wore a
sabre suspended over her shoulder; while helping to tear up the railing
of the sidewalk, she had cut three fingers of her right hand with the
sharp edge of an iron bar. She showed the wound to the crowd, crying:
'_Vive la Republique!_' The other woman had ascended to the top of
the barricade, where, leaning on the flag-staff, and escorted by two
men in blouses, who were armed with muskets and presented arms, she
read aloud the call to arms issued by the Representatives of the Left.
The crowd clapped their hands.

"All this occurred between noon and one o'clock. On this side of the
barricades an immense number of people covered the pavement on both
sides of the boulevard; in some places, silent; in others, crying:
'Down with Soulouque! Down with the traitor!'

"From time to time, mournful processions traversed the multitude; they
consisted of files of closed litters borne by hospital attendants and
soldiers. At their head marched men holding long poles, from which hung
blue placards, on which was inscribed, in huge letters: _Service of
the Military Hospitals_. On the curtains of the litters: _Woun