"Look here!" I said to those surrounding me, "you are asking for arms? Nothing could be more opportune. See! here are three rifles coming towards you; the only thing you have to do is to take them...."
"Oh, if that is all!" they said.
And they rushed towards the soldiers, who pulled up. I was the only man armed in the crowd.
"My friends," I shouted to the soldiers, "give up your guns and no harm shall be done you!"
They consulted for a moment, then gave up their guns. I kept the soldiers covered with mine, prepared to kill the first man who should make any hostile demonstration. The people took the guns, but these were actually not loaded: hence, of course, arose the poor devils' readiness to give them up. The people uttered loud shouts of triumph, the battle had begun with a victory: one gendarme killed and three soldiers of the Royal Guard made prisoners! True, we had to let our captives go, because we did not know what to do with them.
We now went on with our barricades. A little group of students arrived from the top of the rue de l'Université; a tall fair young man marched at its head, dressed in an apple-green frock-coat. He was the only one of the party who possessed a service gun. We fraternised and they joined with us to work at the barricades. The close vicinity of the barracks of the Gardes du Corps on the quai d'Orsay made us fearful of an attack. It was quite impossible for the sentinel not to have heard the two reports of a gun, not to have seen the police fly and not to have raised the alarm. I was tired of turning up paving-stones, so gave my pickaxe to the tall fair youth. He began to pick up the intermediate space, but the crowbar was heavy, fell out of his hands and struck me on the leg.
"Ah! monsieur," he cried, "I beg your pardon most profoundly, for I am sure I must have hurt you badly!"
It was true enough, but there are moments when one does not feel pain.
"Never mind," I said to him; "it is on the bone."
He raised his head. "Do you happen to possess a ready wit?"