Some of them, he saw, carried pitchforks.

The rest had stout cudgels.
Saint Florent stood on the Loire and, in an open space in the centre of the town, the authorities were gathered.

Behind them was a force of gendarmes, and in the middle of their line stood a cannon.
Leigh had, as Jean had told him, left his horse outside the town; and now took up his place, with a number of townspeople, on one side of the square.

As the peasants arrived, they clustered together at the end of the street, waiting for the hour to strike at which the drawing was to begin.

A few minutes before the clock struck, some of the gendarmes left the group in the centre of the square, and advanced to the peasants.