Who were the Friends of the A. B. C.? A society whose ostensible object was the education of children, but the real one the elevation of men. They called themselves friends of the A. B. C.; the _Abaissé_ was the nation, and they wished to raise it. It would be wrong to laugh at this pun, for puns at times are serious in politics; witnesses of this are the _Castratus ad castra_, which made Narses general of an army; the _Barbari_ and _Barberini; fueros fuegos; tu es Petrus et super hanc Petram_, etc., etc. The Friends of the A. B. C. were few in number; it was a secret society, in a state of embryo, and we might almost call it a coterie, if coteries produced heroes. They assembled at two places in Paris,--at a cabaret called _Corinthe_ near the Halles, to which we shall revert hereafter; and near the Panthéon, in a small café on the Place St. Michel, known as the Café Musain, and now demolished: the first of these meeting-places was contiguous to the workmen, and the second to the students. The ordinary discussions of the Friends of the A. B. C. were held in a back room of the Café Musain. This room, some distance from the coffee-room, with which it communicated by a very long passage, had two windows and an issue by a secret staircase into the little Rue des Grés. They smoked, drank, played, and laughed there; they spoke very loudly about everything, and in a whisper about the other thing. On the wall hung an old map of France under the Republic, which would have been a sufficient hint for a police-agent. Most of the Friends of the A. B. C. were students, who maintained a cordial understanding with a few workmen. Here are the names of the principal members, which belong in a certain measure to history,--Enjolras, Combeferre, Jean Prouvaire, Feuilly, Courfeyrac, Bahorel, Lesgle or Laigle, Joly, and Grantaire. These young men formed a species of family through their friendship, and all came from the South, excepting Laigle. This group is remarkable, although it has vanished in the invisible depths which are behind us. At the point of this drama which we have now attained, it will not be labor lost, perhaps, to throw a ray of light upon these heads, before the reader watches them enter the shadows of a tragical adventure.