ely wall, at random, haphazard, no matter
whom, unknown persons, shadows, the very number of whom none can tell;
to cause nameless persons to be slain by nameless persons; and to have
all this vanish in obscurity, in oblivion, is, in very truth, far from
gratifying to one's self-esteem; it looks like hiding one's self, and
in truth that is what it is; it is commonplace. Scrupulous men have the
right to say to you: "You know you are afraid; you would not dare to do
these things publicly; you shrink from your own acts." And, to a
certain extent, they seem to be right. To shoot down people by night is
a violation of every law, human and divine, but it lacks audacity. One
does not feel triumphant afterwards. Something better is possible.

Broad daylight, the public square, the judicial scaffold, the regular
apparatus of social vengeance--to hand the innocent over to these, to
put them to death in this manner, ah! that is different. I can
understand that. To commit a murder at high noon, in the heart of the
town, by means of one machine called court, or court-martial, and of
another machine slowly erected by a carpenter, adjusted, put together,
screwed and greased at pleasure; to say it shall be at such an hour;
then to display two baskets, and say: "This one is for the body, that
other for the head;" at the appointed time to bring the victim bound
with ropes, attended by a priest; to proceed calmly to the murder, to
order a clerk to prepare a report of it, to surround the murder victim
with gendarmes and naked swords, so that the people there may shudder,
and no longer know what they see, and wonder whether those men in
uniform are a brigade of gendarmerie or a band of robbers, and ask one
another, looking at the man who lets the knife fall, whether he is the
executioner or whether he is not rather an assassin! This is bold and
resolute, this is a parody of legal procedure, most audacious and
alluring, and worth being carried out. This is a noble and
far-spreading blow on the cheek of justice. Commend us to this!

To do this seven months after the struggle, in cold blood, to no
purpose, as an omission that one repairs, as a duty that one fulfills,
is awe-inspiring, it is complete; one has the appearance of acting
within one's rights, which perplexes the conscience and makes honest
men shudder.

A terrible juxtaposition, which comprehends the whole case. Here are
two men, a working-man and a prince. The prince commits a cr