d any hearts
but those which surrounded her, exclaimed, "Adieu! adieu! once again, my
dear children. I go to rejoin your father."

She was bound to the plank. Slowly it descended till the neck of the
queen was brought under the groove down which the fatal ax was to glide.
The executioner, hardened by deeds of daily butchery, could not look
upon this spectacle of the misery of the Queen of France unmoved. His
hand trembled as he endeavored to disengage the ax, and there was a
moment's delay. The ax fell. The dissevered head dropped into the basket
placed to receive it. The executioner seized it by the hair, gushing
with blood, raised it high above his head, and walked around the
elevated platform of the guillotine, exhibiting the bloody trophy to the
assembled multitude. One long shout of "Vive la Republique!" rent the
air, and the long and dreadful tragedy of the life of Maria Antoinette
was closed.

The remains of the queen were thrown into a pine coffin and hurried to
an obscure burial. Upon the records of the Church of La Madeleine we now
read the charge, "_For the coffin of the Widow Capet, seven francs._"

CHAPTER XII.

THE PRINCESS ELIZABETH, THE DAUPHIN, AND THE PRINCESS ROYAL.

1793-1795

The dauphin and the princesses.--Painful uncertainty.--Sufferings
of the princesses.--Their dismal cell.--Painful thoughts.--Unwelcome
visitors.--The princesses separated.--Brutality of the
soldiers.--Elizabeth taken before the tribunal.--A group of noble
captives.--Trial of Madame Elizabeth.--Her condemnation.--Sad
reverses.--Character of Madame Elizabeth.--Madame Elizabeth at the
guillotine.--Execution of her companions.--Death of Madame
Elizabeth.--Her faith and piety.--Situation of the dauphin.--The
brute Simon.--Inhuman treatment of the dauphin.--He becomes
insane.--The reaction.--Change in the dauphin's treatment.--Death
of the dauphin.--Sympathy awakened by it.--Situation of the princess
royal.--Her deep sufferings.--Sympathy for the princess royal.--She
is released.--Arrival of the princess royal in Vienna.--Her
settled melancholy.--Love felt for Maria.--She recovers her
cheerfulness.--Maria's marriage.--Her present residence.--Advanced
age of Maria.--Still retains traces of her early sorrows.

When Maria Antoinette was taken from the Temple and consigned to the
dungeons of the Conciergerie, there to await her trial for her life,
the dauphin was imprisoned by himself, though but a child seven years
of