Drunkards were already installed in the wineshops, squabbling and gesticulating.

And there was a cursed noise on all sides, voices shouting amid the constant clatter of feet on the pavement.
"Say, are you coming to sip ?" "Make haste, old man; I'll pay for a glass of bottled wine." "Here's Pauline! Shan't we just laugh!" The doors swung to and fro, letting a smell of wine and a sound of cornet playing escape into the open air.

There was a gathering in front of Pere Colombe's l'Assommoir, which was lighted up like a cathedral for high mass.

_Mon Dieu!_ you would have said a real ceremony was going on, for several capital fellows, with rounded paunches and swollen cheeks, looking for all the world like professional choristers, were singing inside.

They were celebrating Saint-Pay, of course--a very amiable saint, who no doubt keeps the cash box in Paradise.