rson, and a good patriot,
was my _suppleant_ as member of the Committee of Constitution, that is,
he was to supply my place, if I had not accepted or had resigned, being
next in number of votes to me. He was imprisoned in the Luxembourg with
me, was taken to the tribunal and the guillotine, and I, his principal,
was left.

There were two foreigners in the Convention, Anarcharsis Clootz and
myself. We were both put out of the Convention by the same vote,
arrested by the same order, and carried to prison together the same
night. He was taken to the guillotine, and I was again left. Joel Barlow
was with us when we went to prison.

Joseph Lebon, one of the vilest characters that ever existed, and who
made the streets of Arras run with blood, was my _suppleant_, as member
of the Convention for the department of the Pas de Calais. When I
was put out of the Convention he came and took my place. When I was
liberated from prison and voted again into the Convention, he was sent
to the same prison and took my place there, and he was sent to the
guillotine instead of me. He supplied my place all the way through.

One hundred and sixty-eight persons were taken out of the Luxembourg
in one night, and a hundred and sixty of them guillotined next day, of
which I now know I was to have been one; and the manner I escaped that
fate is curious, and has all the appearance of accident.

The room in which I was lodged was on the ground floor, and one of a
long range of rooms under a gallery, and the door of it opened outward
and flat against the wall; so that when it was open the inside of the
door appeared outward, and the contrary when it was shut. I had three
comrades, fellow prisoners with me, Joseph Vanhuele, of Bruges, since
President of the Municipality of that town, Michael Rubyns, and Charles
Bastini of Louvain.

When persons by scores and by hundreds were to be taken out of the
prison for the guillotine it was always done in the night, and those who
performed that office had a private mark or signal, by which they knew
what rooms to go to, and what number to take. We, as I have stated, were
four, and the door of our room was marked, unobserved by us, with that
number in chalk; but it happened, if happening is a proper word, that
the mark was put on when the door was open, and flat against the
wall, and thereby came on the inside when we shut it at night, and the
destroying angel passed by it.(1) A few days after this, Robespier