s of the sovereign people,
menaced by the threats of the _sansculottes_ and _tricoteuses_ who
crowded the galleries and the public enclosure, relying on insane
evidence, acting on the denunciations of madmen, in a poisonous
atmosphere that stupefied the brain, set ears hammering and temples
beating and darkened the eyes with a veil of blood. Vague rumours were
current among the public of jurors bought by the gold of the accused.
But to these the jury as a body replied with indignant protest and
merciless condemnations. In truth they were men neither worse nor better
than their fellows. Innocence more often than not is a piece of good
fortune rather than a virtue; any other who should have consented to put
himself in their place would have acted as they did and accomplished to
the best of his commonplace soul these appalling tasks.

Antoinette, so long expected, sat at last in the fatal chair, in a black
gown, the centre of such a concentration of hate that only the certainty
of what the sentence would be made the court observe the forms of law.
To the deadly questions the accused replied sometimes with the instinct
of self-preservation, sometimes with her wonted haughtiness, and once,
thanks to the hideous suggestion of one of her accusers, with the noble
dignity of a mother. The witnesses were confined to outrage and calumny;
the defence was frozen with terror. The tribunal, forcing itself to
respect the rules of procedure, was only waiting till all formalities
were completed to hurl the head of _the Austrian_ in the face of
Europe.

Three days after the execution of Marie Antoinette Gamelin was called to
the bedside of the _citoyen_ Fortune Trubert, who lay dying, within
thirty paces of the Military Bureau where he had worn out his life, on a
pallet of sacking, in the cell of some expelled Barnabite father. His
livid face was sunk in the pillow. His eyes, which already were almost
sightless, turned their glassy pupils upon his visitor; his parched hand
grasped Evariste's and pressed it with unexpected vigour. Three times he
had vomited blood in two days. He tried to speak; his voice, at first
hoarse and feeble as a whisper, grew louder, deeper:

"Wattignies! Wattignies!... Jourdan has forced the enemy into their camp
... raised the blockade at Maubeuge.... We have retaken Marchiennes, _ca
ira_ ... _ca ira_ ..." and he smiled.

These were no dreams of a sick man, but a clear vision of the truth that
flashed through