olemn thoughts that had been occupying her mind gave place to bright
anticipations of a blissful future with Philip.

For the first time since her arrival at the Conciergerie, she went down
into the public hall. This hall was separated only by an iron grating
from the long and narrow corridor upon which the cells assigned to the
men opened, and in which they spent most of their time. It was against
this grating that they leaned when they wished to converse with their
lady friends; and, during the day, it not unfrequently happened that the
doors were left open, and prisoners of both sexes were allowed to mingle
together. Then, ladies and gentlemen promenaded gayly to and fro;
acquaintances exchanged greetings; and handsome men and beautiful women
chatted as blithely as if they were in their elegant drawing-rooms.

The ancient nobility of France thus entered its protest against the
persecutions of which it was the victim, and convinced even its
bitterest enemies that it was not lacking in spirit and in courage in
the very jaws of death. All the historians who have attempted a
description of the prison life of that time unite in declaring that
contempt of death was never evinced more forcibly than by the victims of
that bloody epoch.

The ladies displayed habits of luxury that were worthy of the days of
the Regency. In the morning they generally appeared in bewitching
negliges; in the afternoon they made more careful and elegant toilettes,
and when evening came they donned the costly, trailing robes which they
had worn at Court, only a few short weeks before. Those who, by the
circumstances attendant upon their arrest, had been prevented from
bringing a varied assortment of dresses with them, expended any amount
of energy and ingenuity in their attempts to rival their more fortunate
companions in the splendor of their costumes. Hence, the prison
resembled a ball-room rather than an antechamber of death. The ladies
were coquettish and bewitching; the men were gallant and impassioned;
and more than one love was born in those days of alternate hope and
terror--more than one love whose ardor was not impaired by fears for the
morrow, and whose delights sweetened the last hours of those who shared
it. There was, of course, little real enjoyment or happiness in those
clays which were constantly disturbed by the arrival of new victims. One
came mourning for her children; another, for her husband. At intervals,
the jailer appeare