CHAPTER XXIV
A CAPITAL
What a noise, what busy people! What ideas for the future in a brain of twenty! What distraction offered by love.—Barnave.
Finally he saw some black walls near a distant mountain. It was the citadel of Besançon. "How different it would be for me," he said with a sigh, "if I were arriving at this noble military town to be sub-lieutenant in one of the regiments entrusted with its defence." Besançon is not only one of the prettiest towns in France, it abounds in people of spirit and brains. But Julien was only a little peasant, and had no means of approaching distinguished people.
He had taken a civilian suit at Fouqué's, and it was in this dress that he passed the drawbridge. Steeped as he was in the history of the siege of 1674, he wished to see the ramparts of the citadel before shutting himself up in the seminary. He was within an ace two or three times of getting himself arrested by the sentinel. He was penetrating into places which military genius forbids the public to enter, in order to sell twelve or fifteen francs worth of corn every year.
The height of the walls, the depth of the ditches, the terrible aspect of the cannons had been engrossing him for several hours when he passed before the great café on the boulevard. He was motionless with wonder; it was in vain that he read the word caf, written in big characters above the two immense doors. He could not believe his eyes. He made an effort to overcome his timidity. He dared to enter, and found himself in a hall twenty or thirty yards long, and with a ceiling at least twenty feet high. To-day, everything had a fascination for him.
Two games of billiards were in progress. The waiters were crying out the scores. The players ran round the tables en-
