Saturday morning, August 1st, the carryall rolled up to the station for
the early train. All made a general rush for the papers which had just
arrived and all of us were equally horrified when a glance showed the
headline-Jaures, the Great Socialist Leader, Assassinated. Decidedly
the plot thickened and naturally we all jumped to the same conclusion--a
political crime.

"There's a stronger hand than the murderer's back of that felony,"
murmured a plain man from the corner of our compartment.

"What makes you say that?"

"Why, can't you see, Monsieur, that our enemies are counting on the deed
to stir up the revolutionary party and breed discord in the country!
It's as plain as day!"

That was rather opening the door to a lengthy discussion, but our
friends refused to debate, especially as we could hear excited masculine
voices rising high above the ordinary tone in the compartments on either
side of us.

The journey drew to a close without any further remarkable incident. It
seemed to me that we passed more up trains than usual, but were not a
moment overdue. There was nothing to complain of. As we approached La
Villette and drew into the Gare de l'Est everybody noticed the
extraordinary number of locomotives that were getting up steam in the
yards. There were rows and rows of them, just as close together as it
was possible to range them, and as far as the eye could see their
glittering boilers extended down the tracks in even lines. Each one had