“Thief!” said I, and pushed him out of my way, and as each man behind came up, he too said, “Thief,” and frowned at the barber, who stood completely dumfounded for a moment. Then we heard him shouting, and as I looked over my shoulder I saw that he was running after us, shaking his fist. But as nobody took any more notice of him, he fell silent when he had caught up to us, and marched on behind. The crowd was so dense when we came to the waterside, just by the first Yonne bridge, that I halted and ordered the drum to beat; this made them open a little, so that we pushed forward like a wedge; but after a few yards we could go no further. I found myself rubbing elbows with two boatmen whom I knew well; one Father Joachim, nicknamed “Calabre,” and the other a man named Gadin, called Gueurlu. “What are you doing here, Master Breugnon,” said one, “all harnessed up like a prize donkey? Are you out for fun or a fight?” “There’s many a true word spoken in jest, Calabre. I have just been appointed Captain of Clamecy, and I am here to defend the town against all its enemies.” “There are no enemies that I know of,” said he. “You must be cracked.” “What do you call that crowd down there, setting fire to houses?” “We are all sorry that your house was burnt the first day, Master,” said he, “but now that it is gone, I don’t see what difference it makes to you if we do go for a fat old thief like Poullard, who grows rich on the wool that he pulls off our backs, and then turns up his nose at us. It is a good deed to rob the likes of him, and anyhow you are in the same boat with us poor men now, all to gain and nothing to lose, so get out of our way!” I hated to get my hands on these poor devils, so I tried to make them hear reason first. “You have everything to lose, Calabre,” I said; “your honor to begin with.” “Honor!” cried he. “Is it good to eat? What’s the use of talking about a thing like that, when you know we may soon be all dead men; dead and blown away as if we had never existed?” “Honor, indeed!” said Gueurlu; “that’s a word they put on rich men’s tombstones, but when we die, they shovel us into the common ditch. Can you tell by the smell if we had honor or not?” “Joachim,” said I, turning away from Gueurlu, “it is true a man does not amount to much all by himself, but get a lot of men together and it’s a different story; many a little makes a mickle, you know, and when the rich are all swept away and forgotten, with their lying epitaphs, down to the very names they are so proud of, then the hard-working people of Clamecy will be known as her real nobility. We must not have it said that we too were rascals.” “Much I care!” said Gueurlu, but Calabre cried, “You are a pig-face! You care for nothing, but I am like Breugnon,--I do care what they say of me, and by St. Nicholas! the rich shall not have all the honor to themselves; high or low, there is not one of them worth our little fingers!”