“You’re in the wrong to insult the revolutionists, Mother Dust-Heap-Corner. This pistol is in your interests. It’s so that you may have more good things to eat in your basket.”

All at once, he heard a shout behind him; it was the portress Patagon who had followed him, and who was shaking her fist at him in the distance and crying:⁠—

“You’re nothing but a bastard.”

“Oh! Come now,” said Gavroche, “I don’t care a brass farthing for that!”

Shortly afterwards, he passed the Hotel Lamoignon. There he uttered this appeal:⁠—

“Forward march to the battle!”

And he was seized with a fit of melancholy. He gazed at his pistol with an air of reproach which seemed an attempt to appease it:⁠—

“I’m going off,” said he, “but you won’t go off!”