Sixty drums lead the way, incessantly sounding, and a mass of armed men surrounded the victim. The reign of terror had begun, in truth. A Governmental order had been issued, forbidding any citizen to show himself at a window; and the infraction of such an order was, in itself, probably a condemnation to death. The citizens were also forbidden to cross any of the streets upon the line of march. A strange effect was this procession. The morning was lowering, cold, dead, and damp; and the noisy sixty drums, purposely used to drown any cry that might be raised, led the way for a hurried, half-disciplined, half-armed horde of armed men; in their midst, a carriage, half-filled with two such as those who formed the escort. And this procession marched through a double row of steel—of pikes and bayonets, held by silent men. At distances were squads of the regulars, armed and prepared as for an action in the field. A strange sight! Thousands of armed men—soldiers with cannon and musket, prepared against a numerous foe; a swiftly passing crowd of men, armed to the teeth, jealously guarding a carriage half-filled with two such as they themselves were,—all against—what? Sixty drums beating to drown—utter silence! Two hundred thousand men, to keep order amongst—space! Armed men—and that was all! On the line, not a human being to be seen beyond the serried lines of armed men. Not a woman’s form for the eye to rest on—every window blind, every street passed, a desert. Paris was a city of the dead. Even the marketplaces were silent, and not even the voice of a child was to be heard. Cannon gaped at every street corner, the artillerymen holding lighted matches; in a word, on all sides were to be seen evidences of preparations to meet a formidable enemy—on not one was the shadow of an enemy to be seen. The King could scarcely be perceived though the forest of steel in which he was lost. He wore a brown coat and a white waistcoat. His hair was raised up already for the executioner’s hands. So great was the noise created by the drums, that he could not hear what the Abbé Edgeworth said, or even what he himself said to that self-devoted gentleman. Therefore he took the minister’s breviary, and opened it at those particular psalms which he had learnt in his captivity, suited to his situation. These he began to recite while the priest prayed beside him. It is said the expression of the two men-at-arms were those of astonishment and admiration. All these warlike preparations were met by the opposition of seven or eight opponents. The procession moved from the Temple up to the boulevards, the line of which was kept by the procession, until it reached the place of execution, on that spot which is now the Place de la Concorde. At that point on the line of march which now lies between the Portes St. Denis and St. Martin, occurred the one sign of any opposition to the tragedy which was about to be completed.