rnalist in
answer to Duthil. "We all earn what we can, you know."

At this moment Rosemonde, while glancing round her, recognised Guillaume
and Pierre, but she was so amazed to see the latter in ordinary civilian
garb that she did not dare to speak to him. Leaning forward she
acquainted Duthil and Massot with her surprise, and they both turned
round to look. From motives of discretion, however, they pretended that
they did not recognise the Froments.

The heat in court was now becoming quite unbearable, and one lady had
already fainted. At last the presiding judge again raised his lisping
voice, and managed to restore silence. Salvat, who had remained standing,
now held a few sheets of paper, and with some difficulty he made the
judge understand that he desired to complete his interrogatory by reading
a declaration, which he had drawn up in prison, and in which he explained
his reasons for his crime. For a moment M. de Larombiere hesitated, all
surprise and indignation at such a request; but he was aware that he
could not legally impose silence on the prisoner, and so he signified his
consent with a gesture of mingled irritation and disdain. Thereupon
Salvat began his perusal much after the fashion of a schoolboy, hemming
and hawing here and there, occasionally becoming confused, and then
bringing out certain words with wonderful emphasis, which evidently
pleased him. This declaration of his was the usual cry of suffering and
revolt already raised by so many disinherited ones. It referred to all
the frightful want of the lower spheres; the toiler unable to find a
livelihood in his toil; a whole class, the most numerous and worthy of
the classes, dying of starvation; whilst, on the other hand, were the
privileged ones, gorged with wealth, and wallowing in satiety, yet
refusing to part with even the crumbs from their tables, determined as
they were to restore nothing whatever of the wealth which they had
stolen. And so it became necessary to take everything away from them, to
rouse them from their egotism by terrible warnings, and to proclaim to
them even with the crash of bombs that the day of justice had come. The
unhappy man spoke that word "justice" in a ringing voice which seemed to
fill the whole court. But the emotion of those who heard him reached its
highest pitch when, after declaring that he laid down his life for the
cause, and expected nothing but a verdict of death from the jury, he
added, as if prophetical