University of Virginia Library

XI.—KING GUILLOTINE.

Need I tell you that his pleading was in vain? Need I tell you that ere
the last word died on his lip, up, up, from a thousand souls—up, up, to the
coiling arose the terrible syllable Death!

And the People without, the legions of new-born freemen, extending far
through the streets of Paris, took up the word—“Death, Death, Death!”

Now Louis of France—now take from your anointed brows, the holy
crown, for to day it will not save your royal head!

Now Marie Antoinette, fair woman whose soft form has hitherto reposed
on beds of down, now take from your snow-white bosom that string of
pearls, for this day they will not save your queenly neck!

Need I picture my friends, the terrible scenes, which followed the condemnation
of Louis Capet?

Now Louis Capet being dethroned, there reigned in Paris another King
—let us go there through the streets black with People, and look at him!
There in the centre of this dense crowd, he raises his gory head—there the
sun streams over his bloody outlines—there gleams his dripping axe—there
there, towering above the heads of millions behold his Bloody Majesty,
the new Lord of Paris, King Guillotine!

A strange king have we here—and look there, standing on the scaffold, a
burly ruffian towers into light, his bared arms red with blood, his hot brow
covered by a hideous scarlet cap! That half-clad ruffian is one of the
Courtiers of the new king, that is The Hangman, Prime Minister to King
Guillotine!

Now let us take our station by his throne; let us behold the offerings
which are brought to King Guillotine!

See—the crowd gives way—hark! That shout! Louis of France
kneels, lays his head upon the block—the axe falls! Behold the first
offering to the Bloody Majesty of France—King Guillotine!

Look—another scene breaks on our view! The soft light of morning
breaks over these palaces, over the spires of Notre Dame—the crowd give
way.

Great Heaven, what sight is this!

The crowd give way—a lovely woman comes trembling up the scaffoldsteps!

Oh, how beautiful! Life in her eyes, on her dewy lip, life in her young
veins, life on the white bosom, that heaves tremulously into light.

Look! with one rude grasp the Hangman tears aside the robes from that
white bosom—she kneels—Oh, God!

Is not that a fair and beautiful neck to lay upon the block? She kneels
—the axe glimmers—falls!

Ah, can that head rolling there like a football, beneath the Executioner's
feet, that head with the long hair dabbled in blood, can that be the head of
Marie Antoinette of France?

Now let us wait by King Guillotine all day long—here, from the death-carts
tumbled out upon the scaffold—here old man and maid, here Poet,
Warrior, Felon, here they come! They kneel—hark! The sound of the
falling axe! The sawdust of the scaffold is drunk with blood—there is a
pile of human heads rising in the light! Behold the offerings to King
Guillotine!

Thus from morning till night, that axe glimmers and falls! Thus from
morning till night, King Guillotine plies his task—the gutters of Paris run
blood, down to the waters of the Seine—the graveyards are full. King
Guillotine knows not where to bury his dead—the stones of the prison
yards are taken up—deep pits are dug—here bring your dead-carts, here
into these yawning cavities, pitch them all, the warrior with his mangled
form, the old man with his grey hair, the maiden with her trampled bosom
—here pitch them all, and let the earth hide these offerings to King
Guillotine.

Now search the streets of Paris for the noblest and pure-souled Patriots
of the Revolution—and search in vain! They are gone—La Fayette and
Paine, and all the heroes are gone. In their place speaks that great orator,
King Guillotine.