every thing, save my intense passion for scenes of terror, I hastened down the stairs into the street, and at the top of my speed hurried to the place of execution. As I went along, the crowded streets and thronged avenues told of some event of more than common interest; and in the words which fell from those around me I could trace that some deep Royalist plot had just been discovered, and that the conspirators would all on that day be executed. Whether it was that the frequent sight of blood was beginning to pall upon the popular appetite, or that these wholesale massacres interested less than the sight of individual suffering, I know not; but certainly there was less of exultation, less of triumphant scorn in the tone of the speakers. They talked of the coming event, as of a common occurrence, which, from mere repetition, was gradually losing interest.
"I thought we had done with these Chouans," said a man in a blouse, with a paper cap on his head. "Pardie! they must have been more numerous than we ever suspected."
"That they were, citoyen," said a haggard-looking fellow, whose features showed the signs of recent strife; "they were the millions who gorged and fed upon us for centuries – who sipped the red grape of Bourdeaux, while you and I drank the water of the Seine."
"Well, their time is come now," cried a third.
"And when will ours come?" asked a fresh-looking, dark-eyed girl, whose dress bespoke her trade of bouquetiere– "Do you call this our time, my masters, when Paris has no more pleasant sight than blood, nor any music save the 'ça ira' that drowns the cries at the guillotine? Is this our time, when we have lost those who gave us bread, and got in their place only those who would feed us with carnage?"
"Down with her! down with the Chouan! à bas la Royaliste!" cried the pale-faced fellow; and he struck the girl with his fist upon the face, and left it covered with blood.
"To the lantern with her! – to the Seine!" shouted several voices; and now, rudely seizing her by the shoulders, the mob seemed bent upon sudden vengeance; while the poor girl, letting fall her basket, begged, with clasped hands, for mercy.
"See here, see here, comrades," cried a fellow, stooping down among the flowers, "she is a Royalist: here are lilies hid beneath the rest."
What sad consequences this discovery might have led to, there is no knowing; when, suddenly, a violent rush of the crowd turned every thought into a different direction. It was caused by a movement of the Gendarmerie à cheval, who were clearing the way for the approaching procession. I had just time to place the poor girl's basket in her hands, as the onward impulse of the dense mob carried me forward. I saw her no more. A flower – I know not how it came there – was in my bosom, and seeing that it was a lily, I placed it in my cap for concealment.
The hoarse clangor of the bassoons – the only instruments which played during the march – now told that the procession was approaching; and then I could see, above the heads of the multitude, the leopard-skin helmets of the dragoons, who led the way. Save this I could see nothing, as I was borne along in the vast torrent toward the place of execution. Slowly as we moved, our progress was far more rapid than that of the procession, which was often obliged to halt from the density of the mob in front. We arrived, therefore, at the Place a considerable time before it; and now I found myself beside the massive wooden railing placed to keep off the crowd from the space around the guillotine.
It was the first time I had ever stood so close to the fatal spot, and my eyes devoured every detail with the most searching intensity. The colossal guillotine itself, painted red, and with its massive ax suspended aloft – the terrible basket, half filled with sawdust, beneath – the coarse table, on which a rude jar and a cap were placed – and, more disgusting than all, the lounging group, who, with their newspapers in hand, seemed from time to time to watch if the procession were approaching. They sat beneath a misshapen statue of wood, painted red like the guillotine. This was the goddess of Liberty. I climbed one of the pillars of the paling, and could now see the great cart, which, like a boat upon wheels, came slowly along, dragged by six horses. It was crowded with people, so closely packed that they could not move their bodies, and only waved their hands, which they did incessantly. They seemed, too, as if they were singing; but the deep growl of the bassoons, and the fierce howlings of the mob, drowned all other sounds. As the cart came nearer, I could distinguish the faces, amid which were those of age and youth – men and women – bold-visaged boys and fair girls – some, whose air bespoke the very highest station, and beside them, the hardy peasant, apparently more amazed than terrified at all he saw around him. On they came, the great cart surging heavily, like a bark in a stormy sea; and now it cleft the dense ocean that filled the Place, and I could descry the lineaments wherein the stiffened lines of death were already marked. Had any touch of pity still lingered in that dense crowd, there might well have been some show of compassion for the sad convoy, whose faces grew ghastly with terror as they drew near the horrible engine.
Down the furrowed cheek of age the heavy tears coursed freely, and sobs and broken prayers burst forth from hearts that until now had beat high and proudly.
"There is the Duc d'Angeaç," cried a fellow, pointing to a venerable old man, who was seated at the corner of the cart, with an air of calm dignity; "I know him well, for I was his perruquier."
"His hair must be content with sawdust this morning, instead of powder," said another; and a rude laugh followed the ruffian jest.
"See! mark that woman with the long dark hair – that is La Bretonville, the actress of the St. Martin."
"I have often seen her represent terror far more naturally," cried a fashionably-dressed man, as he stared at the victim through his opera-glass.
"Bah!" replied his friend, "she despises her audience, voila tout. Look, Henri, if that little girl beside her be not Lucille of the Pantheon."
"Parbleu! so it is. Why, they'll not leave a pirouette in the Grand Opera. Pauvre petite, what had you to do with politics?"
"Her little feet ought to have saved her head any day."
"See how grim that old lady beside her looks: I'd swear she is more shocked at the company she's thrown into, than the fate that awaits her. I never saw a glance of prouder disdain than she has just bestowed on poor Lucille."
"That's the old Marquise d'Estelles, the very essence of our old nobility. They used to talk of their mesalliance with the Bourbons as the first misfortune of their house."
"Pardie! they have lived to learn deeper sorrows."
I had by this time discovered her they were speaking of, whom I recognized at once as the old marquise of the chapel of St. Blois. My hands nearly gave up their grasp as I gazed on those features, which so often I had seen fixed in prayer, and which now – a thought paler, perhaps – wore the self-same calm expression. With what intense agony I peered into the mass, to see if the little girl, her grand-daughter, were with her; and, oh! the deep relief I felt as I saw nothing but strange faces on every side. It was terrible to feel, as my eyes ranged over that vast mass, where grief and despair, and heart-sinking terror were depicted, that I should experience a spirit of joy and thankfulness; and yet I did so, and with my lips I uttered my gratitude that she was spared! But I had not time for many reflections like this; already the terrible business of the day had begun, and the prisoners were now descending from the cart, ranging themselves, as their names were called, in a line below the scaffold. With a few exception, they took their places in all the calm of seeming indifference. Death had long familiarized itself to their minds in a thousand shapes. Day by day they had seen the vacant places left by those led out to die, and if their sorrows had not rendered them careless of life, the world itself had grown distasteful to them. In some cases a spirit of proud scorn was manifested to the very last; and, strange inconsistency of human nature! the very men whose licentiousness and frivolity first evoked the terrible storm of popular fury, were the first to display the most chivalrous courage in the terrible face of the guillotine. Beautiful women, too, in all the pride of their loveliness, met the inhuman stare of that mob undismayed. Nor were these traits without their fruits. This noble spirit – this triumphant victory of the well-born and the great – was a continual insult to the populace, who saw themselves defrauded of half their promised vengeance, and they learned that they might kill, but they could never humiliate them. In vain they dipped their hands