aces' distance:
he fires at hazard, without disquieting himself as to the choice of his
victim; and the soldier, who was bold enough to undertake this double
murder, has not force nor courage to consummate it. He flies, carrying
in his hand a useless whip, with a heavy mantle on his shoulders, in
spite of the detonation of two pistols at his ears, and the rapid steps
of an angry master in pursuit, which ought to have set him upon some
better means of escape. And we find this man, full of youth and vigor,
lying with his face to the ground, in the midst of a public road,
falling without a struggle, or resistance, under the blows of a hammer!

"And suppose the murderer had succeeded in his criminal projects, what
fruit could he have drawn from them?--Leaving, on the road, the two
bleeding bodies; obliged to lead two carriages at a time, for fear of
discovery; not able to return himself, after all the pains he had taken
to speak, at every place at which they had stopped, of the money which
his master was carrying with him; too prudent to appear alone at Belley;
arrested at the frontier, by the excise officers, who would present an
impassable barrier to him till morning, what could he do, or hope to
do? The examination of the car has shown that Rey, at the moment of the
crime, had neither linen, nor clothes, nor effects of any kind. There
was found in his pockets, when the body was examined, no passport, nor
certificate; one of his pockets contained a ball, of large calibre,
which he had shown, in play, to a girl, at the inn at Macon, a little
horn-handled knife, a snuff-box, a little packet of gunpowder, and a
purse, containing only a halfpenny and some string. Here is all the
baggage, with which, after the execution of his homicidal plan, Louis
Rey intended to take refuge in a foreign country.* Beside these absurd
contradictions, there is another remarkable fact, which must not be
passed over; it is this:--the pistol found by Rey is of antique form,
and the original owner of it has been found. He is a curiosity-merchant
at Lyons; and, though he cannot affirm that Peytel was the person who
bought this pistol of him, he perfectly recognizes Peytel as having been
a frequent customer at his shop!

* This sentence is taken from another part of the "Acte
d'accusation."

"No, we may fearlessly affirm that Louis Rey was not guilty of the crime
which Peytel lays to his charge. If, to those who knew him, his mild and
op