Henceforth Simon’s cruelties toward his victim were redoubled. He understood at last what was expected of him, and wished to do credit to his task. The youth, the innocence, the indescribable charm of the little Prince, did not in the least diminish the ferocity of his jailer. On the contrary, it seemed as though the child’s delicate face, his clear eyes, his slender little hands, the nobility of his demeanor, only served to inflame the brutal passions of Simon and his wife. They felt the Prince’s refinement and delicacy, in contrast with their own uncouthness, as a personal affront; and their jealous rage, their implacable hatred, made them take a savage pleasure in attempting to degrade their charge to their own level and extinguishing in this scion of a royal house all recollection of his illustrious family and of his early education. Still another circumstance added to Simon’s abuse of the Prince. Marat,[18] that bloody and ferocious hyena of the Revolution, died at last by the knife of Charlotte Corday. Marat had been a patron of Simon’s, and was largely responsible for the appointment of the cobbler as the Dauphin’s keeper—a position which carried with it a considerable income—and his sudden death threw Simon into a sort of frenzy. When he heard the news, he deserted his prisoner for the first time, and returned in a state of excitement and irritation that relieved itself in abuse and blasphemy. He drank quantities of wine and brandy, and then, inflamed with the liquor, his brain on fire, he dragged his wife and the Prince up to the platform of the Tower, where he smoked his pipe and tried to catch an echo of the far-away lamentations for his friend Marat. “Do you hear that noise down there, Capet?” he shouted to the Prince. “It is the voice of the people, lamenting the loss of their friend. You wear black clothes for your father; I was going to make you take them off to-morrow, but now you shall wear them still longer. Capet shall put on mourning for Marat! But, accursed one, you do not seem much grieved about it! Perhaps you are glad that he is dead?” With these words, furious with rage, he shook the boy, threatened him with his fist, and pushed him violently away. “I do not know the man who is dead,” returned the child, “and you should not say that I am glad. We never wish for the death of anyone.” “Ah, _we_? ‘_We_ wish?’ _We?_” roared the cobbler. “Are you presuming to say _we_, like those tyrants, your forefathers?” “Oh, no,” answered the Prince, “I say _we_, in the plural, meaning myself and my family.” Somewhat appeased by this apology, the cobbler strode up and down, puffing great clouds of smoke from his mouth and laughing to himself as he repeated: “Capet shall put on mourning for Marat!”