Four of the most redoubtable spadassinicides put away for a time,
one of them dead - and all this performed with such an air of
indifference and announced in such casual terms by a wretched little
provincial lawyer!
He began to assume in their eyes a romantic aspect. Even that group
of philosophers of the Cote Gauche, who refused to worship any force
but the force of reason, began to look upon him with a respect and
consideration which no oratorical triumphs could ever have procured
him.
And from the Assembly the fame of him oozed out gradually over Paris.
Desmoulins wrote a panegyric upon him in his paper "Les Revolutions,"
wherein he dubbed him the "Paladin of the Third Estate," a name that
caught the fancy of the people, and clung to him for some time.
Disdainfully was he mentioned in the "Actes des Apotres," the mocking
organ of the Privileged party, so light-heartedly and provocatively
edited by a group of gentlemen afflicted by a singular mental myopy.
The Friday of that very busy week in the life of this young man who
even thereafter is to persist in reminding us that he is not in any
sense a man of action, found the vestibule of the Manege empty of
swordsmen when he made his leisurely and expectant egress between
Le Chapelier and Kersain.
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