He now heard the loud continuous rumbling of the waggons that were
setting out from the markets. Paris was doling out the daily food of its
two million inhabitants. These markets were like some huge central organ
beating with giant force, and sending the blood of life through every
vein of the city. The uproar was akin to that of colossal jaws--a mighty
sound to which each phase of the provisioning contributed, from the
whip-cracking of the larger retail dealers as they started off for the
district markets to the dragging pit-a-pat of the old shoes worn by the
poor women who hawked their lettuces in baskets from door to door.

Florent turned into a covered way on the left, intersecting the group of
four pavilions whose deep silent gloom he had remarked during the night.
He hoped that he might there find a refuge, discover some corner in
which he could hide himself. But these pavilions were now as busy, as
lively as the others. Florent walked on to the end of the street. Drays
were driving up at a quick trot, crowding the market with cages full of
live poultry, and square hampers in which dead birds were stowed in deep
layers. On the other side of the way were other drays from which porters
were removing freshly killed calves, wrapped in canvas, and laid at full
length in baskets, whence only the four bleeding stumps of their legs
protruded. There were also whole sheep, and sides and quarters of beef.
Butchers in long white aprons marked the meat with a stamp, carried it
off, weighted it, and hung it up on hooks in the auction room. Florent,
with his face close to the grating, stood gazing at the rows of hanging
carcasses, at the ruddy sheep and oxen and paler calves, all streaked
with yellow fat and sinews, and with bellies yawning open. Then he
passed along the sidewalk where the tripe market was held, amidst the
pallid calves' feet and heads, the rolled tripe neatly packed in boxes,
the brains delicately set out in flat baskets, the sanguineous livers,