pprehension. A few friends had gathered around her, and placed a table
before her as a partial protection. Her daughter, an exceedingly
beautiful girl of fourteen years of age, with her light brown hair
floating in ringlets over her fair brow and shoulders, clung to her
mother's bosom as if she thought not of herself, but would only, with
her own body, shield her mother's heart from the dagger of the assassin.
Her son, but seven years old, clung to his mother's hand, gazing with a
bewildered look of terror upon the hideous spectacle. The vociferations
of the mob were almost deafening. But the aspect of the group, so lovely
and so helpless, seemed to disarm the hand of violence. Now and then, in
the endless crowd defiling through the room, those in the advance
pressed resistlessly on by those in the rear, some one more tender
hearted would speak a word of sympathy. A young girl came crowded along,
neatly dressed, and with a pleasing countenance. She, however,
immediately began to revile the queen in the coarsest language of
vituperation.

"Why do you hate me so, my friend?" said the queen, kindly; "have I ever
done any thing to injure or to offend you?"

"No! you have never injured me," was the reply, "but it is you who cause
the misery of the nation."

"Poor child!" rejoined the queen, "you have been told so, and have been
deceived. Why should I make the people miserable? I am the wife of the
king--the mother of the dauphin; and by all the feelings of my heart, as
a wife and mother, I am a Frenchwoman. I shall never see my own country
again. I can only be happy or unhappy in France. I was happy when you
loved me."

The heart of the girl was touched. She burst into tears, and exclaimed,
"Pardon me, good queen, I did not know you; but now I see that I have
indeed been deceived, and you are truly good."

Hour after hour of humiliation and agony thus rolled away. The National
Assembly met, and in vain the friends of the king urged its action to
rescue the royal family from the insults and perils to which they were
exposed. But these efforts were met by the majority only with derision.
They hoped that the terrors of the mob would compel the king hereafter
to give his assent to any law whatever which they might frame. At last
the shades of night began to add their gloom to this awful scene, and
even the most bitter enemies of the king did not think it safe to leave
forty thousand men, inflamed with intoxication and rage,