ce only those who would feed us with carnage?'

'Down with her! down with the Chouane! _a bas la Royaliste!_' cried the
pale-faced fellow; and he struck the girl with his fist upon her face,
and left it covered with blood.

'To the Lantern with her--to the Seine!' shouted several voices; and
now, rudely seizing her by the shoulders, the mob seemed bent upon
sudden vengeance; while the poor girl, letting fall her basket, begged
with clasped hands for mercy.

'See here, see here, comrades,' cried a fellow, stooping down among the
flowers, 'she is a Royalist: here are lilies hid beneath the rest.'

What sad consequences this discovery might have led to, there is no
knowing; when, suddenly, a violent rush of the crowd turned every
thought into a different direction. It was caused by a movement of the
_Gendarmerie a cheval_, who were clearing the way for the approaching
procession. I had just time to place the poor girl's basket in her
hands, as the onward impulse of the dense mob carried me forward. I saw
her no more. A flower--I know not how it came there--was in my
bosom, and seeing that it was a lily, I placed it within my cap for
concealment.

The hoarse clangour of the bassoons--the only instruments which played
during the march--now told that the procession was approaching; and then
I could see, above the heads of the multitude, the leopard-skin helmets
of the dragoons, who led the way. Save this I could see nothing, as
I was borne along in the vast torrent towards the place of execution.
Slowly as we moved, our progress was far more rapid than that of the
procession, which was often obliged to halt from the density of the mob
in front. We arrived, therefore, at the Place a considerable time before
it; and now I found myself beside the massive wooden railing placed to
keep off the crowd from the space around the guillotine.

It was the first time I had ever stood so close to the fatal spot, and
my eyes devoured every detail with the most searching intensity. The
colossal guillotine itself, painted red, and with its massive axe
suspended aloft--the terrible basket, half filled with sawdust,
beneath--the coarse table, on which a rude jar and a cup were
placed--and, more disgusting than all, the lounging group, who, with
their newspapers in hand, seemed from time to time to watch if the
procession were approaching. They sat beneath a misshapen statue of
wood, painted red like the guillotine. This was the goddess of