"All right," replied Mauguin, "I will go and draw up your letter and you can get him to sign it for you."
"Very well."
Mauguin took the pen from the solitary scribe, who, being interrupted from his everlasting scribbling for a moment, got up and went to investigate, one after another, the thirty bottles that littered the table. His exploration was all in vain! He might as well have been looking for the Provisional Government. Meanwhile Mauguin wrote, while Charras read over his shoulder, shaking his head as he did so.
"What is wrong?" inquired Odilon Barrot.
"Oh!" said Charras, low enough so as not to be overheard by Mauguin, "that isn't the way to write to military men ... dear, dear!"
Mauguin had come to the same conclusion himself, for he suddenly flung down his pen and exclaimed—
"Devil take me, I don't know what to say to them!"
"Oh, hang it all," said Odilon Barrot, "let the gentlemen write their own letter—and let us be content with getting it signed—they will understand it better than we do."
And the pen was passed to Charras.
In a moment the proclamation was drawn up. Charras was writing the last line when General Lobau came in; he, too, no doubt, was looking for the Provisional Government.