But if the guillotine was merciful—and of this there can be no doubt—on the other hand—it may be questioned if so many people would have been condemned to death during the Reign of Terror if the old slow mode of decapitation had remained. By a singular fatality the head of Guillotin himself was taken off by the very instrument he had introduced from Italy into France. All the vagabondage of Paris was present at this execution. The trees bent under the masses of people who had climbed into them. There was not breathing room, while, by connivance of the most bloodthirsty of the revolutionary leaders, the spaces immediately round the scaffold were occupied by the men who had effected the massacre of September. These men were there to applaud. But when the carriage containing the King drew up before the scaffold, the mob was silent—even the September men, for a little time, held their peace. The King perceiving the carriage stop, looked up, and said to the Abbé, “We have arrived, I think.” The minister replied by a gesture. One of the three brothers Sanson, the three executioners of Paris, opened the door. The gendarmes got out, whereupon the King, closing the door, and placing his hand upon the minister, he said authoritatively to those who were pressing forward, “Gentlemen, I recommend this gentleman to your care. Be brave enough to save him from insult after I am dead. I charge you to save him!” No one replied. “I charge you to save him!” One of them, more sinister than the rest, replied. “Yes, yes,” he said; “be at peace—we will save him, and let us hear no more about it.” Louis now stepped from the carriage. Three executioners’ attendants came forward, and wished to undress him at the foot of the scaffold. He waved them back, took off his coat, cravat, and turned down his shirt. The executioners again approached him. “What do you seek to do?” he asked, angrily. “Bind you!” they said, seizing his hands. “Bind _me_!” the King cried, all the passion of centuries of petted and idolized royal blood rising in the veins which were now in a few moments to be empty. “Never!—I will not permit it. Do your work, but you shall not bind me—do not even dream of such a thing!” This man, the descendant of hundreds of kings, could not, even after recommending his soul to God, uncrown himself. The Convention might call him a citizen—but he had, as all kings must, lived in the belief of that half-divinity which is still in some places supposed to surround a king. The executioners had their duty to do. Here was a man to be guillotined. Men who were guillotined had to be bound. Then they must bind their man. They again approached. A veritable struggle was about to commence at the foot of the scaffold. The King saved himself from himself in time. He remembered the dignity of his death, and he looked towards the Abbé.