Morbus, out of gratitude, came running up, and they fell dead under the table. The children played at cholera, calling it "Nicholas Morbus" and "Morbus the Rascal." And yet the cholera had its terrible side: the brilliant sunshine, the indifference of the crowd, the ordinary course of life, which was continued everywhere, gave a new character and a different sort of frightfulness to those days of pestilence. You felt uncomfortable in every limb; you were parched by a cold, dry north wind; the atmosphere had a certain metallic flavour which hurt the throat. In the Rue du Cherche-Midi, wagons of the artillery-depot were used to cart away the dead bodies. In the Rue de Sèvres, which was completely devastated, especially on one side, the hearses came and went from door to door; there were not enough of them to satisfy the demand; a voice would shout from the window: "Here, hearse, this way!" The driver answered that he was full up and could not attend to everybody. One of my friends, M. Pouqueville, on his way to dine at my house on Easter Sunday, was stopped at the Boulevard du Mont-Parnasse by a succession of biers, nearly all of which were carried by bearers. He saw, in this procession, the coffin of a young girl, on which was laid a wreath of white roses. A smell of chlorine spread a tainted atmosphere in the wake of this floral ambulance. On the Place de la Bourse, where processions of workmen used to meet, singing the Parisienne, one often saw funerals pass by towards the Montmartre Cemetery as late as eleven o'clock at night, by the light of pitch torches. The Pont-Neuf was blocked with litters laden with patients for the hospitals or dead who had expired on the road. The toll ceased for some days on the Pont des Arts. The booths disappeared and, as the north-east wind was blowing, all the stall-holders and all the shopkeepers on the quays closed their doors. One met tilted conveyances preceded by a "crow," or mute, with a registrar of births, deaths and marriages walking in front, dressed in mourning, and carrying a list in his hand. There was a dearth of these tabellions, or registrars; they had to send for more from Saint-Germain, the Villette, Saint-Cloud. For the rest, the hearses were piled up with five or six coffins, kept in place with ropes. Omnibuses and hackney-coaches were employed for the same purpose: it was not uncommon to see a cab adorned with a dead body stretched across the apron. A few of the dead were laid out in the churches: a priest sprinkled holy water over those collected faithful of Eternity. In Athens, the people believed that the wells near the Piræus had been poisoned; in Paris, the tradesmen were accused of poisoning their wine, spirits, sugar-plums and provisions. Several individuals had their clothes torn from their backs, were dragged in the gutter, flung into the Seine. The authorities were to blame for these stupid or guilty opinions.