t the very moment when the hideous procession began its march, Madame
de Lebel, the wife of a painter, who owed many benefits to Madame de
Lamballe, was trying to get near the prison, hoping to hear news of
her. Seeing the great commotion in the crowd, she inquired the cause.
When some one replied: "It is Lamballe's head that they are going to
carry through Paris," she was seized with horror, and, turning back,
took refuge in a hairdresser's shop on the Place Bastille. Hardly had
she done so when the crowd entered the Place. The murderers came into
the shop and required the hairdresser to arrange the head of the
Princess. They washed it, and powdered the fair hair, all soiled with
{354} blood. Then one of the assassins cried joyfully: "Now, at any
rate, Antoinette can recognize her!" The procession resumed its march.
From time to time they called a halt before a wine-shop. Wishing to
empty his glass, the scoundrel who had the Princess's head in his hand,
set it flat down on the lead counter. Then it was put back on the end
of a pike. The heart was on another pike, and other individuals
dragged along the headless corpse. In this manner they arrived in
front of the Temple. It was three o'clock in the afternoon.

On that day the royal family had been refused permission to go into the
garden. They were in the little tower when the cries of the multitude
became audible. The workmen who were then employed in tearing down the
walls and buildings contiguous to the Temple dungeon, mingled with the
crowd, increased also by innumerable curious spectators, and uttered
furious shouts. One of the Municipal Guards at the Temple closed doors
and windows, and pulled down curtains so that the captives could see
nothing.

On the street in front of the enclosure a tricolored ribbon had been
fastened across, with this inscription: "Citizens, you who know how to
ally the love of order with a just vengeance, respect this barrier; it
is necessary to our surveillance and our responsibility." This was the
sole dike they meant to oppose to the torrent. At the side of this
ribbon stood a municipal officer named Danjou, formerly a priest, who
was called Abbe Six-feet, on account of his {355} height. He mounted
on a chair and harangued the crowd. He felt his face touched by Madame
de Lamballe's head, still on the end of a pike which the bearer shook
about and gesticulated with, and also by a rag of her chemise, soaked
with blood a