"In person." "You know," said Bauer, "that once the Prussians realize that the burning house is near the powder-magazine, they will rush here to save the powder, and the inclosure in which the military wagons are stored. In the meantime the Rue de Haguenau will be empty, and that is the time to carry the gate and enter the town. The general can reach the great square without firing, and at the first report five hundred patriots will open their windows and begin to shoot at the Prussians." "Have you men to sound the tocsin?" "Two in each church." "Then all is ready," said Stephan. "Let us take a look at the powder-magazine, and then go back." They returned by the ramparts, and found that, as Bauer had said, the wooden house was within fifty feet of the inclosure. At eleven o'clock they entered the courtyard of the Golden Lion. The sixty men were ready and full of enthusiasm, and understood that they had been intrusted with a great enterprise. At a quarter past eleven Bauer shook hands with Stephan, and, assuring himself that he was provided with his tinder-box and flint, made his way toward the wooden house. Stephan, who remained behind, called his sixty men and explained his plan to them. Each understood what he had to do, and swore to carry it out as far as possible. They waited. Half-past eleven struck. Stephan, at the highest window in the house, was watching for the first gleam of light. Scarcely had the strokes ceased to vibrate in the air than a reddish glare began to color the roofs in the upper part of the town. Stephan ran down; the time had come. The men were drawn up in the yard in three platoons of twenty men each. Stephan half opened the gate. Every one was running to the other part of town. He ordered his men to march toward the Haguenau gate in single file, while he himself ran ahead, crying: "Fire! in the higher parts of the town, comrades! Fire! near the powder-magazine! Fire! save the wagons! Fire! keep the powder from exploding!" Stephan ran to the guard of twenty-four men at the gate. The sentinel, taking him for the sergeant of the post, did not stop him. "Every one of you to the upper part of the town to save the wagons and the powder. To the fire! to the fire!" Not one of the twenty-four men remained, save the sentinel, chained by his orders. But his curiosity got the better of his discipline, and he asked the pretended sergeant what had happened. The latter, full of good-will toward his subordinates, told him that a servant had fired the wooden house belonging to the landlord of the Golden Lion. In the meantime the patrol was approaching from behind. "What is that?" asked the sentinel. "Oh, nothing," replied Stephan, "a patrol." And so saying he slipped a gag into the sentinel's mouth and pushed him toward the first two men of the patrol, who bound him firmly.