_friperie_, and equipped myself with the dress appointed; and, with
the card fixed upon my bosom, returned to take my station beside the
pillar. But no sylph came again; no form rivaled the zephyr before me.
I listened for that soft, low voice; but listened in vain. Yet what
was all this but the common sport of a masquerade?

However, an object soon drew the general attention so strongly, as to
put an end to private curiosity for the time. This was a mask in the
uniform of a national guard, but so outrageously fine that his
_entrée_ excited an universal burst of laughter. But when, after a few
displays of what was apparently all but intoxication, he began a
detail of his own exploits, it was evident that the whole was a daring
caricature; and as nothing could be less popular among us than the
heroes of the shops, the Colonels Calicot, and Mustaches _au
comptoir_, all his burlesque told incomparably. The old officers among
us, the Vendéans, and all the ladies--for the sex are aristocrats
under every government and in every region of the globe--were
especially delighted. "Alexandre Jules Cæsar," colonel of the "brave
battalion of the Marais," was evidently worth a dozen field-marshals
in his own opinion; and his contempt for Vendôme, Marlborough, and
Frederick le Grand, was only less piquant than the perfect imitation
and keen burlesque of Santerre, Henriot, and our municipal warriors.
At length when his plaudits and popularity were at their height, he
proposed a general toast to the "young heroism," of the capital, and
prefaced it by a song, in great repute in the old French service.

"AVANCEZ, BRAVE GUERRIERS."

"Shoulder arms--brave regiment!
Hark, the bugle sounds 'advance.'