Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1901-09-08

| torches; and they were singing with a
mad. stirring emphasis, their arms up
raised, long, unnurtured, while their
] feet glided in eerie. lithesome cadence
over the cobbles of the street.
At times the words of the singers
were confused. There were erratic
halts to get breath. Then they dashed
forward again with the rush of con-
fusion. But every time the chorus was
reached the words sounded loud as a
ttmbrel. The volume of the refrain qulv-
cred in the haze of the misty night.
they were crude words. They were
the protest of a race with centuries OF
toll on their shoulders. feeling their
new strength, using 1t barbariously,
but decisive.y, against the orgies and
villainles Of a discrepit Court.
France was in the throes of the Great
Revolution. The sword was unsheath-
ed. and fair fields lay waste, and wo-
men and men had murder in their
hearts. Paris seethed and foamed.
Somehow, mysterious almost-with
that curious magic which in an hour
can form a mob, gathering together
from dark corners as from highways,
all the wretched and the despicable and
the unclad-the women Of Paris. the
poor women. the market women, the
w~asherwomen, all those who had grown
gauut and wan with labor and no re-
spite, and had weak children crying in
their faces, had by impulse come TO-
gether.
At first 1t was a handful of aching
hearted dlscontents, who walled, then
groWled, then broke into a snarl till
the snarl gave way to a shout and the
mob tumbled in fierce frenzy along the
boulevards.
This was at the fading of the day.
No n could say who was leading the
throng, no one could say where they
were going. Only for certain was
known that each street gave up it's
quota of starved and wild-visaged wo-
men.
Along the streets they marched.
Now and then a revolutionist threw
his red cap towards the women. They
scrambled and fought iendishly for
it. With a scream the victor placed it
on her head.
And now the procession, ragged and
turbulent, was blocked in the bottle
necked Rue de Fermey. Those behind
could not discern the cause of the stop
page, but over the babel there reached
them the cry of singers:
Away with a life of care,
Away with a life of pain
And then there burst forth afresh
all the uproar born of uncertainty and
darkness and passion.
THE lamp-post, the lamp-post, the
lamp-post for the robbers of France"
went up to the black heavens.
THE la%mp-post! Oh, the blessed
l~amp-post," cried an old bag, fang
mouthed, from the top of a cask. Let
us on to the palace, to Louis and Ma
RE A~ntoinette. Why dawdle you
here2'
She stretched forth a brown stick of
a withered arm and shook her skinny
fingers at the revelry Of the dancers
and the singers.
BE quiet, old WITCH bawled a
husky-throated washerwoman.
"Quiet, old WITCH" cried others.
The hays face, brown as leather,
was furrowed with lines. Streaks of
matter. grey hair fell lank by the hol-
l~ow-jawed cheek. When she spoke a
long and ~discolored fang made the
countenance %forbidding,
A daring girl raised high a torch and
shook it before the wizened face, re-
vealing its responsiveness.
What is it. hag?" she asked.
A roar OF wild laughter shook the
street, not a joyous laugh but the laugh
of folks gone mad.
Still the dancers whirled, still the
| painting song, Away with a life of