ese limbs of the law their former names, or nearly so.
By the kings command, Maitre Corbeau was permitted to add a tail to his initial letter and to call himself Gorbeau. Maitre Renard was less lucky; all he obtained was leave to place a P in front of his R, and to call himself Prenard; so that the second name bore almost as much resemblance as the first.
Now, according to local tradition, this Maitre Gorbeau had been the proprietor of the building numbered 50-52 on the Boulevard de l''Hopital. He was even the author of the monumental window.
Hence the edifice bore the name of the Gorbeau house.
Opposite this house, among the trees of the boulevard, rose a great elm which was three-quarters dead; almost directly facing it opens the Rue de la Barriere des Gobelins, a street then without houses, unpaved, planted with unhealthy trees, which was green or muddy according to the season, and which ended squarely in the exterior wall of Paris.
An odor of copperas issued in puffs from the roofs of the neighboring factory.
The barrier was close at hand.
In 1823 the city wall was still in existence.
This barrier itself evoked gloomy fancies in the mind.
It was the road to Bicetre.
It was through it that, under the Empire and the Restoration, prisoners condemned to death re-entered Paris on the day of their execution.