a mortally wounded man, their
breasts were bared. Their braces crossed upon the chest--their wide red
belts bristling with arms--their cry of attack and rage, all that must
have given a decidedly fantastic touch to the scene. Arrived in the
square, they perceived the gendarmerie drawn up in motionless ranks,
through which it would have been impossible to force a passage. They
halted an instant and seemed to consult together. Lepretre, who was, as
I have said, their senior and their chief, saluted the guard with his
hand, saying with that noble grace of manner peculiar to him:

"Very well, gentlemen of the gendarmerie!"

Then after a brief, energetic farewell to his comrades, he stepped in
front of them and blew out his brains. Guyon, Amiet and Hyvert assumed
a defensive position, their double-barrelled pistols levelled upon their
armed opponents. They did not fire; but the latter, considering this
demonstration as a sign of open hostility, fired upon them. Guyon fell
dead upon Lepretre's body, which had not moved. Amiet's hip was broken
near the groin. The "Biographie des Contemporains" says that he was
executed. I have often heard it said that he died at the foot of the
scaffold. Hyvert was left alone, his determined brow, his terrible eye,
the pistol in each practiced and vigorous hand threatening death to
the spectators. Perhaps it was involuntary admiration, in his desperate
plight, for this handsome young man with his waving locks, who was
known never to have shed blood, and from whom the law now demanded the
expiation of blood; or perhaps it was the sight of those three corpses
over which he sprang like a wolf overtaken by his hunters, and the
frightful novelty of the spectacle, which for an instant restrained
the fury of the troop. He perceived this and temporized with them for a
compromise.

"Gentlemen," said he, "I go to my death! I die with all my heart! But
let no one approach me or I shall shoot him--except this gentleman," he
continued, pointing to the executioner. "This is an affair that concerns
us alone and merely needs a certain understanding between us."

This concession was readily accorded, for there was no one present who
was not suffering from the prolongation of this horrible tragedy, and
anxious to see it finished. Perceiving their assent, he placed one
of his pistols between his teeth, and drawing a dagger from his belt,
plunged it in his breast up to the hilt. He still remained standing and