in the cemetery of the Chapel of Braque.

The populace thronged the avenues of the law courts in
particular, because they knew that the Flemish ambassadors,
who had arrived two days previously, intended to be present
at the representation of the mystery, and at the election of
the Pope of the Fools, which was also to take place in the
grand hall.

It was no easy matter on that day, to force one's way into
that grand hall, although it was then reputed to be the largest
covered enclosure in the world (it is true that Sauval had not
yet measured the grand hall of the Château of Montargis).
The palace place, encumbered with people, offered to the
curious gazers at the windows the aspect of a sea; into which
five or six streets, like so many mouths of rivers, discharged
every moment fresh floods of heads. The waves of this
crowd, augmented incessantly, dashed against the angles of
the houses which projected here and there, like so many
promontories, into the irregular basin of the place. In the
centre of the lofty Gothic* façade of the palace, the grand
staircase, incessantly ascended and descended by a double
current, which, after parting on the intermediate landing-place,
flowed in broad waves along its lateral slopes,--the grand
staircase, I say, trickled incessantly into the place, like a
cascade into a lake. The cries, the laughter, the trampling
of those thousands of feet, produced a great noise and a great
clamor. From time to time, this noise and clamor redoubled;
the current which drove the crowd towards the grand staircase
flowed backwards, became troubled, formed whirlpools.