the best. As I was unable to
eat, I was nourished on excellent Burgundy wine and soup, and Mme.
Brongniart was in constant attendance upon me. All this solicitude
ought to have quieted me, especially as my friends took a less black
view of things than I did. Nevertheless, they did not succeed in
banishing my evil forebodings. "What is the use of living; what is
the use of taking care of oneself?" I would often ask my good friends,
for the fears that the future held over me made life distasteful to
me. But I must acknowledge that even with the furthest stretch of my
imagination I guessed only at a fraction of the crimes that were to be
committed.

I remember having supped at the Brongniarts's with His Excellence M.
de Sombreuil, at that time governor of the Invalides. He brought us
the news that an attempt was threatening to take the arms that he had
in reserve, "But," he added, "I have hidden them so well that I defy
any one to find them." The good man did not consider that one could
trust no one but oneself. As the arms were very soon abstracted, it
seems evident that he was betrayed by some of the servants in his
employ.

M. de Sombreuil, as notable for his private virtues as for his
military talents, was among the prisoners who were to be killed in
their cells on the second of September. The murderers gave him his
life at the tears of supplication of his heroic daughter, but,
villainous even in granting pardon, they compelled Mlle. de Sombreuil
to drink a glass of the blood that flowed in streams in front of the
prison. For a long time afterward the sight of anything with red
colour made this unfortunate young woman vomit horribly. Some years
later (in 1794) M. de Sombreuil was sent to the scaffold by the
Revolutionary tribunal.

I had made up my mind to leave France. For some years I had cherished
the desire to go to Rome. The large number of portraits I had engaged
to paint had, however, hindered me from putting my plan into
execution. But I could now paint no longer; my broken spirit, bruised
with so many horrors, shut itself entirely to my art. Besides,
dreadful slanders were pouring upon my friends, my acquaintances and
myself, although, Heaven knows, I had never hurt a living soul. I
thought like the man who said, "I am accused of having stolen the
towers of Notre Dame; they are still in their usual place, but I am
going away, as I am evidently to blame." I left several portraits I
had begun, among them M