laid in position across the highway. In spite of all modern progress,
much the same ways of attack have still to be adopted in siege work.
Then, with some further pantomine explaining how it would be
impossible to see or hurt them under cover of that smoke, the Cossacks
induced the crowd to raise the poles again. This time everybody's
blood was up, and, urging one another on with short staccato shouts,
dozens of willing men, stripped to the waist, jumped forward, and the
timbers were driven with a tremendous impetus against the gates. As
they crashed against the wood, and half splintered the stout
entrances, a succession of shots rang out from the roofs, and I saw
the French marauders sliding rapidly down and fall out of sight into
the compound. The defence had been broken down--at least, at this
point. It seemed quite over.

It was the work of a moment to hack the gates aside, and through the
choking fumes and charred remains the whole infuriated crowd now
poured. The little blaze, having met with much brick and stone, was
smouldering out, and so long as it was not kindled anew there was no
danger of the fire spreading.

Like a rush of muddy waters, the sweating, brown-backed men, now mad
with a lust for pillage, tore through the first courtyard. I was born
along with them perforce like a piece of flotsam on a raging
flood-tide; there was no turning back. Besides, such things do not
happen every day....

The Frenchmen and their companions had already disappeared inside, and
on the ground lay two of the pawn-shop men, dead or dying, swimming
silently in their own blood. Beyond this there was a first hall, empty
and devoid of furniture, excepting for immensely long wooden counters;