After the man who decreed the 'protest of corpses' had spoken, and had given this formula of their common soul, there issued from all mouths a strangely satisfied and terrible cry, funereal in sense and triumphant in tone: 'Long live death! Let us all remain here! ' 'Why all? ' said Enjolras.
'All! All! ' Enjolras resumed: 'The position is good; the barricade is fine. Thirty men are enough. Why sacrifice forty? ' They replied: 'Because not one will go away.
' 'Citizens,' cried Enjolras, and there was an almost irritated vibration in his voice, 'this republic is not rich enough in men to indulge in useless expenditure of them. Vain-glory is waste. If the duty of some is to depart, that duty should be fulfilled like any other.
' Enjolras, the man-principle, had over his co-religionists that sort of omnipotent power which emanates from the absolute. Still, great as was this omnipotence, a murmur arose. A leader to the very finger-tips, Enjolras, seeing that they murmured, insisted.
He resumed haughtily: 'Let those who are afraid of not numbering more than thirty say so. ' The murmurs redoubled. 'Besides,' observed a voice in one group, 'it is easy enough to talk about leaving. The barricade is hemmed in. ' 'Not on the side of the Halles,' said Enjolras.
'The Rue Mondétour is free, and through the Rue des Prêcheurs one can reach the Marché des Innocents. ' 'And there,' went on another voice, 'you would be captured.
You would fall in with some grand guard of the line or the suburbs; they will spy a man passing in blouse and cap. ‘Whence come you? ’ ‘Don’t you belong to the barricade? ’ And they will look at your hands. You smell of powder. Shot.
' Enjolras, without making any reply, touched Combeferre’s shoulder, and the two entered the tap-room. They emerged thence