The Friends of the A.B.C. were not numerous, it was a secret society in the state of embryo, we might almost say a coterie, if coteries ended in heroes. They assembled in Paris in two localities, near the fish-market, in a wine-shop called Corinthe, of which more will be heard later on, and near the Pantheon in a little café in the Rue Saint-Michel called the Café Musain, now torn down; the first of these meeting-places was close to the workingman, the second to the students.

The assemblies of the Friends of the A.B.C. were usually held in a back room of the Café Musain.