of many generations: he too experiences that man's
tribunal is not in this Earth; that if he had no Higher one, it were not
well with him.

A King dying by such violence appeals impressively to the imagination;
as the like must do, and ought to do. And yet at bottom it is not the
King dying, but the man! Kingship is a coat: the grand loss is of the
skin. The man from whom you take his Life, to him can the whole combined
world do more? Lally went on his hurdle; his mouth filled with a gag.
Miserablest mortals, doomed for picking pockets, have a whole five-act
Tragedy in them, in that dumb pain, as they go to the gallows,
unregarded; they consume the cup of trembling down to the lees. For
Kings and for Beggars, for the justly doomed and the unjustly, it is a
hard thing to die. Pity them all: thy utmost pity, with all aids and
appliances and throne-and-scaffold contrasts, how far short is it of the
thing pitied!

A Confessor has come; Abbe Edgeworth, of Irish extraction, whom the King
knew by good report, has come promptly on this solemn mission. Leave the
Earth alone, then, thou hapless King; it with its malice will go its
way, thou also canst go thine. A hard scene yet remains: the parting
with our loved ones. Kind hearts environed in the same grim peril with
us; to be left _here_! Let the Reader look with the eyes of Valet Clery
through these glass doors, where also the Municipality watches, and see
the cruelest of scenes:

"At half-past eight, the door of the anteroom opened: the Queen appeared
first, leading her Son by the hand; then Madame Royale and Madame
Elizabeth: they all flung themselves into the arms of the King. Silence
reigned for some minutes; interrupted only by sobs. The Queen made a
movement to lead his Majesty towards the inner room where M. Edgeworth
was waiting unknown to them: 'No,' said the King, 'let us go into the
dining-room; it is there only that I can see you.' They entered there; I
shut the door of it, which was of glass. The King sat down, the Queen on
his left hand, Madame Elizabeth on his right, Madame Royale almost in
front; the young Prince remained standing between his Father's legs.
They all leaned toward him, and often held him embraced. This scene of
woe lasted an hour and three-quarters; during which we could hear
nothing; we could see only that always when the King spoke, the sobbings
of the Princesses redoubled, continued for some minutes; and that then
the King began again to