About five o'clock
There was a rumor that the enemy were making ready to attack the Croix-Rouge and take their position in flank . By this time the barricades in the Rues Martignac and Bellechasse had been carried , the red-legs were beginning to make their appearance at the end of the Rue de Lille , and soon all that remained was a little band of fanatics and men with the courage of their opinions , Maurice and some fifty more , who were resolved to sell their lives dearly , killing as many as they could of those Versaillese , who treated the federates like thieves and murderers , dragging away the prisoners they made and shooting them in the rear of the line of battle . Their bitter animosity had broadened and deepened since the days before ; it was war to the knife between those rebels dying for an idea and that army , inflamed with reactionary passions and irritated that it was kept so long in the field . About five o'clock , as Maurice and his companions were finally falling back to seek the shelter of the barricades in the Rue du Bac , descending the Rue de Lille and pausing at every moment to fire another shot , he suddenly beheld volumes of dense black smoke pouring from an open window in the Palace of the Legion of Honor . It was the first fire kindled in Paris , and in the furious insanity that possessed him it gave him a fierce delight . The hour had struck ; let the whole city go up in flame , let its people be cleansed by the fiery purification ! But a sight that he saw presently filled him with surprise : a band of five or six men came hurrying out of the building , headed by a tall varlet in whom he recognized Chouteau , his former comrade in the squad of the 106th .