four o’clock in the morning
These carnival follies had their special Pandemonium in the rue Saint-Honore and their Napoleon in Musard , a small man born expressly to lead an orchestra as noisy as the disorderly audience , and to set the time for the galop , that witches ' dance , which was one of Auber 's triumphs , for it did not really take form or poesy till the grand galop in `` Gustave '' was given to the world . That tremendous finale might serve as the symbol of an epoch in which for the last fifty years all things have hurried by with the rapidity of a dream . Now , it happened that the grave Thaddeus , with one divine and immaculate image in his heart , proposed to Malaga , the queen of the carnival dances , to spend an evening at the Musard ball ; because he knew the countess , disguised to the teeth , intended to come there with two friends , all three accompanied by their husbands , and look on at the curious spectacle of one of these crowded balls . On Shrove Tuesday , of the year 1838 , at four o'clock in the morning , the countess , wrapped in a black domino and sitting on the lower step of the platform in the Babylonian hall , where Valentino has since then given his concerts , beheld Thaddeus , as Robert Macaire , threading the galop with Malaga in the dress of a savage , her head garnished with plumes like the horse of a hearse , and bounding through the crowd like a will-o-the-wisp . `` Ah ! '' said Clementine to her husband , `` you Poles have no honor at all ! I did believe in Thaddeus .