The townsfolk welcomed the insurgents as though they were deliverers.  The men embraced them, while the women brought them food.  Old men were to be seen weeping at the doors.  And the joyousness was of an essentially Southern character, pouring forth in clamorous fashion, in singing, dancing, and gesticulation.  As Miette passed along she was carried away by a farandole[*] which spread whirling all round the Grand’ Place.  Silvere followed her.  His thoughts of death and his discouragement were now far away.  He wanted to fight, to sell his life dearly at least.  The idea of a struggle intoxicated him afresh.  He dreamed of victory to be followed by a happy life with Miette, amidst the peacefulness of the universal Republic.

     [*] The farandole is the popular dance of Provence.

The fraternal reception accorded them by the inhabitants of Orcheres proved to be the insurgents’ last delight.  They spent the day amidst radiant confidence and boundless hope.  The prisoners, Commander Sicardot, Messieurs Garconnet, Peirotte and the others, who had been shut up in one of the rooms at the mayor’s, the windows of which overlooked the Grand’ Place, watched the farandoles and wild outbursts of enthusiasm with surprise and dismay.

“The villains!” muttered the Commander, leaning upon a window-bar, as though bending over the velvet-covered hand-rest of a box at a theatre:  “To think that there isn’t a battery or two to make a clean sweep of all that rabble!”

Then he perceived Miette, and addressing himself to Monsieur Garconnet, he added:  “Do you see, sir, that big girl in red over yonder?  How disgraceful!  They’ve even brought their mistresses with them.  If this continues much longer we shall see some fine goings-on.”

Monsieur Garconnet shook his head, saying something about “unbridled passions,” and “the most evil days of history.”  Monsieur Peirotte, as white as a sheet, remained silent; he only opened his lips once, to say to Sicardot, who was still bitterly railing:  “Not so loud, sir; not so loud!  You will get us all massacred.”

As a matter of fact, the insurgents treated the gentlemen with the greatest kindness.  They even provided them with an excellent dinner in the evening.  Such attentions, however, were terrifying to such a quaker as the receiver of taxes; the insurgents he thought would not treat them so well unless they wished to make them fat and tender for the day when they might wish to devour them.

At dusk that day Silvere came face to face with his cousin, Doctor Pascal.  The latter had followed the band on foot, chatting with the workmen who held him in the greatest respect.  At first he had striven to dissuade them from the struggle; and then, as if convinced by their arguments, he had said to them with his kindly smile:  “Well, perhaps you are right, my friends; fight if you like, I shall be here to patch up your arms and legs.”