ghtened complexion of the child seemed to give meaning
to his words,--at least, so the man thought, for a slight frown passed
over his high, thoughtful brow.

"Spiders, then," he said, after a short pause, "are different from men;
with us, the small do not get the better of the great. Hum! do you still
miss your mother?"

"Oh, yes!" and the boy advanced eagerly to the table.

"Well, you will see her once again."

"When?"

The man looked towards a clock on the mantelpiece,--"Before that clock
strikes. Now, go back to your spiders." The child looked irresolute and
disinclined to obey; but a stern and terrible expression gathered slowly
over the man's face, and the boy, growing pale as he remarked it, crept
back to the window.

The father--for such was the relation the owner of the room bore to
the child--drew paper and ink towards him, and wrote for some minutes
rapidly. Then starting up, he glanced at the clock, took his hat and
cloak, which lay on a chair beside, drew up the collar of the mantle
till it almost concealed his countenance, and said, "Now, boy, come
with me; I have promised to show you an execution: I am going to keep my
promise. Come!"

The boy clapped his hands with joy; and you might see then, child as
he was, that those fair features were capable of a cruel and ferocious
expression. The character of the whole face changed. He caught up his
gay cap and plume, and followed his father into the streets.

Silently the two took their way towards the Barriere du Trone. At a
distance they saw the crowd growing thick and dense as throng after
throng hurried past them, and the dreadful guillotine rose high in the
light blue air. As they came into the skirts of the mob, the father, for
the first time, took his child's hand. "I must get you a good place for
the show," he said, with a quiet smile.

There was something in the grave, staid, courteous, yet haughty bearing
of the man that made the crowd give way as he passed. They got near the
dismal scene, and obtained entrance into a wagon already crowded with
eager spectators.

And now they heard at a distance the harsh and lumbering roll of the
tumbril that bore the victims, and the tramp of the horses which guarded
the procession of death. The boy's whole attention was absorbed in
expectation of the spectacle, and his ear was perhaps less accustomed
to French, though born and reared in France, than to the language of
his mother's lips,--and she was Eng