Beleaguered French presidential candidate Francois Fillon has urged supporters to fight on, in a speech to a mass rally in Paris.
He told tens of thousands of supporters, many waving tricolour flags, that he would be cleared over allegations he paid his wife and children for work they did not do.
The rally is seen as a crucial test of his popularity.
Calls are growing for him to quit and senior allies have left his campaign.
And just before the rally Christian Estrosi, a close ally of former President Nicolas Sarkozy, told BFM TV that senior Republicans would propose an alternative candidate in the coming hours.
However, he said it was important “not to humiliate” Mr Fillon and allow him a “dignified” way out.
Mr Fillon has seen his popularity slip in opinion polls.
The Republican party will hold crisis talks on the candidacy on Monday.
But in a rousing speech to supporters in driving rain, Mr Fillon urged his supporters not to give up the fight and thanked them for their support.
Referring to his opponents, he said: “They think I’m alone, they want me to be alone. Are we alone? Thank you for your presence.”
He said he would be exonerated when an impending criminal investigation got under way, and it would be the turn of his accusers to feel ashamed.
A prize worth the fight: Hugh Schofield, BBC News, Paris
Francois Fillon is engaged in a trial of strength at the top of his Republicans party. He knows he is increasingly isolated, and that moves are afoot to get him replaced by Alain Juppe. But he also thinks the presidential prize is worth the fight, and that he still has plenty of reserves.
Fillon’s central argument is that he was chosen as candidate by an overwhelming majority of voters in the November primary. These people – he repeated it in his address – chose me because of my manifesto. And that manifesto remains the best way of saving France from decline.
By holding the rally, Fillon has now thrown down the gauntlet. To the party he is saying: Drop me if you will. But if you do, know that you may also lose millions of voters who – like the people who have turned out here in Paris – chose me because of my ideas.
These voters are not obliged to follow Alain Juppe. They may choose someone else – maybe Marine Le Pen.
“The problem is that by then it will be too late, the election will have been skewed,” he said.
But he admitted that he had made a mistake in employing his wife, Penelope Fillon, who accompanied him at the rally.
A counter-demonstration, billed as a pot-banging rally against corruption by officials, was also being held in the Place de la Republique, AFP reported.
Poll slump
Mr Fillon’s wife said on Saturday that she did carry out parliamentary work for him.
In an interview for French magazine Journal du Dimanche (in French), Penelope Fillon said everything was “legal and declared” and he would have paid someone else to do it if she had not.
The latest opinion polls suggest that Mr Fillon would be eliminated in the first round of presidential election voting on 23 April, with far-right leader Marine Le Pen and liberal Emmanuel Macron likely to progress to contest the election run-off on 7 May.
A survey published in Journal du Dimanche (in French) suggests that 71% of those polled want Mr Fillon to step down.
In another blow to Mr Fillon’s campaign, his spokesman Thierry Solere became the latest member of the campaign team to announce his departure on Friday.
Mr Fillon’s woes have raised speculation that Alain Juppe, another former prime minister whom he overwhelmingly defeated in November’s Republicans’ primary, could return to the race if he were to pull out.
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