I sprang from my bed and looked out of my window. A strange change had taken place in the teeming little caserne at the corner. Instead of the usual groups of well-behaved boy-soldiers in rough uniforms, the barrack looked deserted, and its lower windows had been closed up to their top panes with bags of hay and mattresses. Not a soldier, not even a sentry, was to be seen. I dressed myself and went out to collect news. The carts that had disturbed us during the night had been not only employed in removing all preparations for the banquet, but in taking every loose paving-stone out of the way. I found the Place de la Madeleine full of people, all looking up at the house of Odillon Barrot, asking "What next?" and "What shall we do?" Odillon Barrot was the hero of the moment--literally _of the moment_. In forty-eight hours from that time his name had faded from the page of history. In the Place de la Concorde there was more excitement, for threats were being made to cross the bridge and to insult the Chambers. The Pont de l'Institut, notwithstanding the efforts of the garde municipale or mounted police, was greatly crowded. A party of dragoons, on sorrel ponies barely fourteen hands high, rode up and began to clear the bridge, but gently and gradually. The crowd was retiring as fast as its numbers would permit, when some of the municipal guard rode through the ranks of the dragoons and set themselves, with ill-judged roughness, to accelerate the operation. The crowd grew angry, and stones began to be thrown at the guard and soldiers. Growing anxious for the women I had left in the Rue Neuve de Berri, I returned home by side-streets. A crowd had collected on the Champs Elysees about thirty yards from the corner of our street, and was forming a barricade. All were shouting, all gesticulating. Citadines at full speed were driving out of reach of requisition; horses were going off disencumbered of their vehicles; the driver of a remise was seated astride his animal, the long flaps of his driving-coat covering it from neck to tail; a noble elm was being hewn down by hatchets and even common knives. An omnibus, the remise, a few barrels and dining-tables, a dozen yards of _pave_ torn up by eager hands, a sentry-box, some benches and the tree, formed the barricade. _Gamins_ and _blouses_ worked at it. The respectables looked on and did not trouble the workers. Suddenly there was a general stampede among them. A squadron of about fifty dragoons charged up the Champs Elysees. One old peasant-woman in a scanty yellow-and-black skirt, which she twitched above her knees, led the retreat. But soon they stopped and turned again, while the dragoons rode slowly back, breathing their horses. Nobody was angry, for nobody had been hurt, but they were frightened enough.