There were only women, but there were
thousands of them and neither prayer nor argument could persuade them
to make up their minds to go home.
"Nothing will happen," I told them. "Look here now, be reasonable and
go home to bed."
"But we want to see...."
"What do you want to see?"
"Want to see what kind of a reception the Prussians will get if they
come."
Aside from this the mob was remarkably easy to get on with. A strict
order had forbidden that anyone be permitted to enter or leave Paris
until sunrise. As a result the capital found itself cut off from the
suburbs, and lots of little working girls, who came in for the day
from Clichy or Levallois-Perret, couldn't get back to their homes in
the evening. They had to camp out under the stars.
"It's very amusing," they said, "here we are just like soldiers."
I even heard one of them say:
"What a pity there isn't always war."
That same night, about eleven o'clock, a heavy sound was heard coming
from the direction of the city. Some urchins shouted:
"It's the soldiers. It's the soldiers."
An entire Algerian division was, as a matter of fact, detraining and
hurrying to fight before Paris. Behind it followed a long line of
taxi-cabs, the famous line of taxi-cabs requisitioned by General
Gallieni to carry munitions to the battle field of the Ourcq.
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