"What do you want?" he asked. "To speak to M. Laffitte." "What about?" "About the Revolution." "Who are you?" "Students from the École polytechnique." "M. Laffitte has gone to bed." And the porter shut the door in the faces of the five young fellows. Charras had a great mind to force open the door and even went so far as to propose it, but, being dissuaded by his companions, he merely heaped abuse upon the concierge. The manner of their reception at Laffitte's did not encourage them to pay the other calls they had planned to make: they agreed to call next day on La Fayette and Casimir Périer, but in the meanwhile they would return to the rue des Fossés-du-Temple. They therefore went back to the Hôtel Fresnoy and accommodated themselves as best they could on mattresses, on chairs, or on the floor. Next day, at dawn, they went to a professor of mathematics, named Martelet, who coached for the École examinations. M. Martelet lived at No. 16 rue des Fossés-du-Temple. They wanted to procure themselves civilian's dress--the king's highway not being safe in open daylight for the students who wore the École uniform. The five friends found all, they required at M. Martelet's house. Then, as they feared that if they called upon La Fayette too early, the same thing would happen as when they called too late at Laffitte's, they set to work to build a barricade in order to pass the time of waiting. A wigmaker was busy in a house opposite that of M. Martelet, curling and powdering a wig: the young men invited him to join them; but, whether the wigmaker's political opinions differed from the makers of the barricade, or whether he was too much engrossed in his art and thought his time was better employed in powdering and curling wigs, he refused. By chance the barricade and the wig were both finished at the same moment. As there was nobody to guard the barricade, they took a model of a head with its pedestal from the wigmaker's shop, placed it behind the paving-stones, dressed it up in the freshly powdered and curled wig, rammed a three-cornered hat jauntily on the top and confided the protection of the barricade, to the mannikin, forbidding the wigmaker under pain of death to dare to make any change in the strategic arrangements. After which they directed their course to La Fayette's dwelling-place. La Fayette was not at home. The young people left their names with the concierge, and were about to resume their Odyssey by going to knock at the door of Casimir Périer. But Charras thought two fruitless attempts were enough, and left his comrades to fulfil their third attempt by themselves, which proved as barren as the first two. He sought out Carrel to inquire where fighting was taking place. But nobody seemed to know. There was a general idea that there was fighting going on near the Hôtel de Ville, and, at certain moments, the great bell of Notre-Dame could be heard ringing. As Charras had