to be
endless, lasting, with few brief intervals, from Wednesday till Sunday
morning,--as one of the strangest seen in the Revolution. Long night
wears itself into day, morning's paleness is spread over all faces; and
again the wintry shadows sink, and the dim lamps are lit: but through
day and night and the vicissitude of hours, Member after Member is
mounting continually those Tribune-steps; pausing aloft there, in the
clearer upper light, to speak his Fate-word; then diving down into
the dusk and throng again. Like Phantoms in the hour of midnight; most
spectral, pandemonial! Never did President Vergniaud, or any terrestrial
President, superintend the like. A King's Life, and so much else that
depends thereon, hangs trembling in the balance. Man after man
mounts; the buzz hushes itself till he have spoken: Death; Banishment:
Imprisonment till the Peace. Many say, Death; with what cautious
well-studied phrases and paragraphs they could devise, of explanation,
of enforcement, of faint recommendation to mercy. Many too say,
Banishment; something short of Death. The balance trembles, none can yet
guess whitherward. Whereat anxious Patriotism bellows; irrepressible by
Ushers.

The poor Girondins, many of them, under such fierce bellowing of
Patriotism, say Death; justifying, motivant, that most miserable word
of theirs by some brief casuistry and jesuitry. Vergniaud himself says,
Death; justifying by jesuitry. Rich Lepelletier Saint-Fargeau had been
of the Noblesse, and then of the Patriot Left Side, in the Constituent;
and had argued and reported, there and elsewhere, not a little, against
Capital Punishment: nevertheless he now says, Death; a word which may
cost him dear. Manuel did surely rank with the Decided in August last;
but he has been sinking and backsliding ever since September, and the
scenes of September. In this Convention, above all, no word he could
speak would find favour; he says now, Banishment; and in mute wrath
quits the place for ever,--much hustled in the corridors. Philippe
Egalite votes in his soul and conscience, Death, at the sound of which,
and of whom, even Patriotism shakes its head; and there runs a groan
and shudder through this Hall of Doom. Robespierre's vote cannot be
doubtful; his speech is long. Men see the figure of shrill Sieyes
ascend; hardly pausing, passing merely, this figure says, "La Mort sans
phrase, Death without phrases;" and fares onward and downward. Most
spectral, pande