Some soldiers exclaimed, "Why do you take away our muskets! We would fight for you and with you!"
The Representatives consulted whether they should accept this offer. Schoelcher was inclined to do so. But one of them remarked that some Mobile Guards had made the same overtures to the insurgents of June, and had turned against the Insurrection the arms which the Insurrection had left them.
The muskets therefore were not restored.
The disarming having been accomplished, the muskets were counted; there were fifteen of them.
"We are a hundred and fifty," said Cournet, "we have not enough muskets."
"Well, then," said Schoelcher, "where is there a post?"
"At the Lenoir Market."
"Let us disarm it."
With Schoelcher at their head and escorted by fifteen armed men the Representatives proceeded to the Lenoir Market. The post of the Lenoir Market allowed themselves to be disarmed even more willingly than the post in the Rue de Montreuil. The soldiers turned themselves round so that the cartridges might be taken from their pouches.
The muskets were immediately loaded.