Explore "The Parisians, Book X" by Edward Bulwer-lytton on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Among things indescribable is that which is called "Agitation" in Paris -- "Agitation" without riot or violence -- showing itself by no disorderly act, no turbulent outburst. Perhaps the cafes are more crowded; passengers in the streets stop each other more often, and converse in small knots and groups; yet, on the whole, there is little externally to show how loudly the heart of Paris is beating. A traveller may be passing through quiet landscapes, unconscious that a great battle is going on some miles off, but if he will stop and put his ear to the ground he will recognise by a certain indescribable vibration, the voice of the cannon.
But at Paris an acute observer need not stop and put his ear to the ground; he feels within himself a vibration -- a mysterious inward sympathy which communicates to the individual a conscious thrill -- when the passions of the multitude are stirred, no matter how silently.