nted by the Table of the Rights of Man.

It was here in the nave that twice a week, from five in the evening to
eleven, were held the public assemblies. The pulpit, decorated with the
colours of the Nation, served as tribune for the speakers who harangued
the meeting. Opposite, on the Epistle side, rose a platform of rough
planks, for the accommodation of the women and children, who attended
these gatherings in considerable numbers.

On this particular morning, facing a desk planted underneath the pulpit,
sat in red cap and _carmagnole_ complete the joiner from the Place
Thionville, the _citoyen_ Dupont senior, one of the twelve forming the
Committee of Surveillance. On the desk stood a bottle and glasses, an
ink-horn, and a folio containing the text of the petition urging the
Convention to expel from its bosom the twenty-two members deemed
unworthy.

Evariste Gamelin took the pen and signed.

"I was sure," said the carpenter and magistrate, "I was sure you would
come and give in your name, _citoyen_ Gamelin. You are the real thing.
But the Section is lukewarm; it is lacking in virtue. I have proposed to
the Committee of Surveillance to deliver no certificate of citizenship
to any one who has failed to sign the petition."

"I am ready to sign with my blood," said Gamelin, "for the proscription
of these federalists, these traitors. They have desired the death of
Marat: let them perish."

"What ruins us," replied Dupont senior, "is indifferentism. In a Section
which contains nine hundred citizens with the right to vote there are
not fifty attend the assembly. Yesterday we were eight and twenty."

"Well then," said Gamelin, "citizens must be obliged to come under
penalty of a fine."

"Oh, ho!" exclaimed the joiner frowning, "but if they all came, the
patriots would be in a minority.... _Citoyen_ Gamelin, will you drink a
glass of wine to the health of all good sansculottes?..."

On the wall of the church, on the Gospel side, could be read the words,
accompanied by a black hand, the forefinger pointing to the passage
leading to the cloisters: "_Comite civil, Comite de surveillance, Comite
de bienfaisance._" A few yards further on, you came to the door of the
erstwhile sacristy, over which was inscribed: _Comite militaire_.

Gamelin pushed this door open and found the Secretary of the Committee
within; he was writing at a large table loaded with books, papers, steel
ingots, cartridges and samples of saltpetre-bear