Note 26
Chapter 107. The Lions’ Den

The thieves had already approached Andrea, some screaming, “La savate—La savate!”[26] a cruel operation, which consists in cuffing a comrade who may have fallen into disgrace, not with an old shoe, but with an iron-heeled one. Others proposed the anguille, another kind of recreation, in which a handkerchief is filled with sand, pebbles, and two-sous pieces, when they have them, which the wretches beat like a flail over the hea…