VOLUME I
CHAPTER I.
THE COMMISSARY IS CALLED.
In the Paris of the first half of this century there was no darker,
dingier, or more forbidding quarter than that which lay north of the
Rue de Rivoli, round about the great central market, commonly called
the Halles.
The worst part of it, perhaps, was the Rue Assiette d'Etain, or
Tinplate Street. All day evil-looking loafers lounged about its
doorways, nodding lazily to the passing workmen, who, blue-bloused,
with silk cap on head, each with his loa under his arm, came to take
their meals at the wine-shop at the corner; or gossiping with the
porters, male and female, while the one followed closely his usual
trade as a cobbler, and the other attended to her soup.
By day there was little traffic. Occasionally a long dray, on a
gigantic pair of wheels, drawn by a long string of white Normandy
horses in single file, with blue harness and jangling bells, filled up
the roadway. Costermongers trundled their barrows along with strange,
unmusical cries. Now and again an empty cab returning to its stable,
with weary horse and semi-somnolent coachman, crawled through the
street.
But at night it was otherwise. Many vehicles came dashing down
Tinplate Street: carriages, public and private, of every variety, from
the rattletrap cab hired off the stand, or the decent coach from the
livery stable, to the smart spick-and-span brougham, with its
well-appointed horses and servants in neat livery.
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