When we turned into the Place d'Armes, we saw the crowd already gathered in front of the postoffice; innumerable faces were leaning over the iron balustrade, one trying to get before the other, and interrogating the courier, who did not answer a word. The postmaster, Mr. Pernette, opened the window, which was lighted up from the inside, and the package of letters and papers flew from the coach through this window into the room; the window closed, and the crack of the postilion's whip warned the crowd to get out of the way. "The papers, the papers!" shouted the crowd from every side. The coach set off again and disappeared through the German gate. "Let us go to Hoffman's cafe," said Mr. Goulden. "Hurry! the papers will go there, and if we wait we shall not be able to get in." As we crossed the square we heard some one running behind us, and the clear, strong voice of Margarot, saying: "They have come, I have them." All the half-pay officers were following him, and as the moon was shining we could see they were coming at a great pace. We rushed into the cafe and were hardly seated near the great stove of Delft ware, when the crowd at once poured in through both doors. You should have seen the faces of the half-pay officers at that moment. Their great three-cornered hats, defiling under the lamps, their thin faces with their long mustaches hanging down, their sparkling eyes peering into the darkness, made them look like savages in pursuit of something. Some of them squinted in their impatience and anxiety, and I think that they did not see anything at all, and that their thoughts were elsewhere with Bonaparte;--that was fearful. The people kept coming and coming, till we were suffocating, and were obliged to open the windows. Outside in the street, where the cavalry barracks were, and on the Fountain Square, there was a great tumult. "We did well to come at once," said Mr. Goulden, springing on a chair and steadying himself with his hand on the stove. Others were doing the same thing, and I followed his example. Nothing could be seen but the eager faces and the big hats of the officers, and the great crowd on the square outside in the moonlight. The tumult increased and a voice cried, "Silence." It was the Commandant Margarot, who had mounted upon a table. Behind him the gendarmes Keltz and Werner looked on, and at all the open windows people were leaning in to hear. On the square at the same instant somebody repeated, "Silence, silence." And it was at once so still that you would have said, there was not a soul there.