Pagina 647 di 896

And yet, observing the strange law of contradiction which obtains

in all such cases, the time was long, while it flamed by so fast.

A revolutionary tribunal in the capital, and forty or fifty

thousand revolutionary committees all over the land; a law of the

Suspected, which struck away all security for liberty or life,

and delivered over any good and innocent person to any bad and

guilty one; prisons gorged with people who had committed no

offence, and could obtain no hearing; these things became the

established order and nature of appointed things, and seemed to

be ancient usage before they were many weeks old. Above all, one

hideous figure grew as familiar as if it had been before the

general gaze from the foundations of the world--the figure of the

sharp female called La Guillotine.