ons laid aside their
feuds for the hour to unite against the formidable man who was marching
over all factions to his gory throne. There was bold Lecointre, the
declared enemy; there, creeping Barrere, who would reconcile all
extremes, the hero of the cowards; Barras, calm and collected; Collet
d'Herbois, breathing wrath and vengeance, and seeing not that the crimes
of Robespierre alone sheltered his own.

The council was agitated and irresolute. The awe which the uniform
success and the prodigious energy of Robespierre excited still held the
greater part under its control. Tallien, whom the tyrant most feared,
and who alone could give head and substance and direction to so many
contradictory passions, was too sullied by the memory of his own
cruelties not to feel embarrassed by his position as the champion
of mercy. "It is true," he said, after an animating harangue from
Lecointre, "that the Usurper menaces us all. But he is still so beloved
by his mobs,--still so supported by his Jacobins: better delay open
hostilities till the hour is more ripe. To attempt and not succeed is
to give us, bound hand and foot, to the guillotine. Every day his power
must decline. Procrastination is our best ally--" While yet speaking,
and while yet producing the effect of water on the fire, it was
announced that a stranger demanded to see him instantly on business that
brooked no delay.

"I am not at leisure," said the orator, impatiently. The servant placed
a note on the table. Tallien opened it, and found these words in pencil,
"From the prison of Teresa de Fontenai." He turned pale, started up,
and hastened to the anteroom, where he beheld a face entirely strange to
him.

"Hope of France!" said the visitor to him, and the very sound of his
voice went straight to the heart,--"your servant is arrested in the
streets. I have saved your life, and that of your wife who will be. I
bring to you this letter from Teresa de Fontenai."

Tallien, with a trembling hand, opened the letter, and read,--

"Am I forever to implore you in vain? Again and again I say, 'Lose not
an hour if you value my life and your own.' My trial and death are fixed
the third day from this,--the 10th Thermidor. Strike while it is yet
time,--strike the monster!--you have two days yet. If you fail,--if you
procrastinate,--see me for the last time as I pass your windows to the
guillotine!"

"Her trial will give proof against you," said the stranger. "Her death
is th