lowed by immense crowds to the grand Cathedral of Nôtre Dame, where she was seated on an altar, and there received the worship of the multitudes. The Sabbath, by a national decree, was abolished; the Bible was burned publicly by the executioner; and on the graveyards was inscribed, "Death is an eternal sleep!"

At Lyons, a similar scene was enacted, where a fête in honour of Liberty was celebrated. The churches were all closed, the Decade, or Sabbath of Reason, proclaimed, and an image of a vile character was carried in procession, followed by vast crowds, shouting, "Down with the aristocrats! Long life to the guillotine !" After the image came an ass, bearing the Cross, the Bible, and the communion service; and these were led to an altar, where a fire was lighted, the Cross and Bible burned, the communion bread trampled under foot, and the ass made to drink out of the communion cup. Wherever democracy reigned, the services of religion were interrupted, the burial service vanished, baptisms ceased, the sick and dying were unconsoled by religion, while every species of vice, obscenity, and

licentiousness were practised without concealment or control. The establishments for charity, the hospitals, and all humane institutions were swept away, and their funds seized by the agents of the people. Even the sepulchres of the dead were upturned. The noble, the wise, and the ancient, the barons of feudal ages, the heroes of the Crusades, the military chieftains, the ancient kings, resting in longhallowed tombs, the mightiest monarchs of the nation, the "chief ones of the earth," were moved from their rest, and rose to meet the coming of this awful day, while the treasures of their tombs were rifled by vulgar hands, and their very sculls kicked around as footballs for sport.

Meantime the sovereigns of Europe were making preparations to meet this flood of democratic lava, which threatened to overflow every surrounding land. Vast armies began to gather on every side, and avenging navies hovered along the shores. This added the fervour of patriotic devotion to the mania of democracy.

"Ye sons of France! awake to glory!

Hark! hark! what myriads bid you rise!

Your children, wives, and grandsires hoary,

Behold their tears, and hear their cries!

Shall hateful tyrants, mischief breeding,
With hireling hosts, a ruffian band,
Affright and desolate our land,
While Peace and Liberty lie bleeding?

To arms! to arms! ye brave!

The avenging sword unsheath!

March on march on! to victory or death!"

These inspiring sentiments, sung in the thrilling notes of the Marseilles Hymn, were echoed from one end of the land to the other, awakening a whirlwind of enthusiasm. The wants of thousands thrown out of employ, joined with the excitement of patriotism, raised an army unparalleled in numbers. It is calculated that, at one time, one million two hundred thousand Frenchmen were thus enrolled, and at the command of the National Legislature, while the millions of property, not otherwise squandered, were employed to clothe, feed, and equip this incomprehensible multitude. All France was bristling like an armed field; while every mandate of government, backed as it was by such a military force, was utterly resistless. Thus it was that the Reign of Terror was so silent, awful, and hopeless.

Behold, then, through the terror-stricken and miserable land, the national troops employed

in arresting every person suspected of favouring aristocracy, or conspicuous as the holder of wealth, or object of hate, envy, or suspicion to all in the possession of power. Behold the prisons of the capital, of the provincial cities, and of the country villages, crammed to overflowing with the rich, the noble, and the learned. No regard was paid to station, age, or sex. Gray hairs and blooming childhood, stern warriors and beautiful maidens, coarse labourers and noble matrons, were huddled together into the damps, and filth, and darkness of a common dungeon, while the guillotine daily toiled in its bloody work of death.

Whenever a fresh supply of funds was demanded for the national service, a new alarm of invasion or of counter-revolution was spread, and then followed new arrests of those suspected, or of those who held any species of wealth. In disposing of captives to make room for new supplies, some were poniarded in prison, some shot, and some guillotined. At last, it was found needful to adopt a more summary method, and the National Legislature decreed that the land must be cleared of traitors and

aristocrats, not by trial and single execution, but by a slaughter of masses. A corps was formed of the most determined and bloodthirsty, and sent all over the land to execute this mandate. In carrying out this unparalleled system of cold-blooded murder, various modes were adopted. One was called the Republican Baptism, by which men, women, and children were placed in a vessel with a trap-door in the bottom, and carried out into the midst of the waves; then the trap-door was opened, and the crew, getting into a boat, left their victims to perish. Another method was called the Republican Marriage. By this, two of the opposite sex, generally an old person and a young one, were bereft of all clothing, then tied together, and, after being tortured a while, thrown into the waves. Another mode was called the mitrillade or fusillade. Sixty, or more, captives were bound, and ranged in two files along a deep ditch dug for the purpose. At the two extremities of each file, were placed cannons loaded with grapeshot, and, at a given signal, these were discharged on this mass of human beings. But a few were entirely killed at the first discharge. Wounded and muti