emned of Prairial to trees marked down for felling.

The _citoyenne_ Rochemaure declared herself pregnant. A surgeon, who was
likewise one of the jury, was directed to see her. She was carried out
fainting to her dungeon.

"Ah!" sighed the Pere Longuemare, "these judges and jurors are men very
deserving of pity; their state of mind is truly deplorable. They mix up
everything and confound a Barnabite with a Franciscan."

The execution was to take place the same day at the _Barriere du
Trone-Renverse_. The condemned, their toilet completed, hair cropped and
shirt cut down at the neck, waited for the headsman, packed like cattle
in the small room separated off from the Gaoler's office by a glazed
partition.

When presently the executioner and his men arrived, Brotteaux, who was
quietly reading his Lucretius, put the marker at the page he had begun,
shut the book, stuffed it in the pocket of his coat, and said to the
Barnabite:

"What enrages me, Reverend Father, is that I shall never convince you.
We are going both of us to sleep our last sleep, and I shall not be able
to twitch you by the sleeve and tell you: 'There you see; you have
neither sensation nor consciousness left; you are inanimate. What comes
after life is like what goes before.'"

He tried to smile; but an atrocious spasm of pain wrung his heart and
vitals, and he came near fainting.

He resumed, however:

"Father, I let you see my weakness. I love life and I do not leave it
without regret."

"Sir," replied the monk gently, "take heed, you are a braver man than I,
and nevertheless death troubles you more. What does that mean, if not
that I see the light, which you do not see yet?"

"Might it not also be," said Brotteaux, "that I regret life because I
have enjoyed it better than you, who have made it as close a copy of
death as possible?"

"Sir," said the Pere Longuemare, his face paling, "this is a solemn
moment. God help me! It is plain we shall die without spiritual aid. It
must be that in other days I have received the sacraments lukewarmly and
with a thankless heart, for Heaven to refuse me them to-day, when I have
such pressing need of them."

The carts were waiting. The condemned were loaded into them pell-mell,
with hands tied. The woman Rochemaure, whose pregnancy had not been
verified by the surgeon, was hoisted into one of the tumbrils. She
recovered a little of her old energy to watch the crowd of onlookers,
hoping against hope to f