e
suffered was that of Morris, who warned him and his friends, both in
Paris and America, that if his case was stirred the knife would fall
on him. Paine declares (see xx.) that this danger kept him silent till
after the fall of Robespierre. None knew so well as Morris that
there were no charges against Paine for offences in France, and that
Robespierre was awaiting that action by Washington which he (Morris) had
rendered impossible. Having thus suspended the knife over Paine for six
months, Robespierre interpreted the President's silence, and that
of Congress, as confirmation of Morris's story, and resolved on the
execution of Paine "in the interests of America as well as of France";
in other words to conciliate Washington to the endangered alliance with
France.

Paine escaped the guillotine by the strange accident related in a
further chapter. The fall of Robespierre did not of course end his
imprisonment, for he was not Robespierre's but Washington's prisoner.
Morris remained Minister in France nearly a month after Robespierre's
death, but the word needed to open Paine's prison was not spoken.
After his recall, had Monroe been able at once to liberate Paine, an
investigation must have followed, and Morris would probably have taken
his prisoner's place in the Luxembourg. But Morris would not present his
letters of recall, and refused to present his successor, thus keeping
Monroe out of his office four weeks. In this he was aided by Bourdon
de l'Oise (afterwards banished as a royalist conspirator, but now a
commissioner to decide on prisoners); also by tools of Robespierre who
had managed to continue on the Committee of Public Safety by laying
their crimes on the dead scapegoat--Robespierre. Against Barere (who had
signed Paine's death-warrant), Billaud-Varennes, and Colloit d'Her-bois,
Paine, if liberated, would have been a terrible witness. The Committee
ruled by them had suppressed Paine's appeal to the Convention, as they
presently suppressed Monroe's first appeal. Paine, knowing that Monroe
had arrived, but never dreaming that the manoeuvres of Morris were
keeping him out of office, wrote him from prison the following letters,
hitherto unpublished.

1 There is no need to delay the reader here with any
argument about Paine's unquestionable citizenship, that
point having been settled by his release as an American, and
the sanction of Monroe's action by his government. There was
no genuine