It was in the evening of the last winter which beheld its snows crimsoned with revolutionary carnage, when he presented himself, undismayed, before that committee, whose horrible nature will be better described by merely relating the names of its members, then sitting, than by the most animated and elaborate delineations of all its deadly deeds of rapine and of blood. At a table, covered with green cloth, shabbily lighted, in one of the committee rooms of the national assembly, were seated Robespierre, Collot d'Herbois, Carnot, and David. They were occupied in filling up the lists for the _permanent_ guillotine, erected very near them, in la Place de la Revolution, which the executioners were then clearing of its gore, and preparing for the next day's butchery. In this devoted capital more blood had, during that day, streamed upon the scaffold, than on any one day during the revolution. The terrified inhabitants, in darkness, in remote recesses of their desolate houses, were silently offering up a prayer to the great God of Mercy to release them, in a way most suitable to his wisdom, from such scenes of deep dismay, and remorseless slaughter. Robespierre, as usual, was dressed with great neatness and gayety; the _savage_ was generally _scented_, whilst his associates were habited, en Jacobin, in the squalid, filthy fashion of that era of the revolution, in the dress of blackguards. Mr. G---- bowed, and addressed them very respectfully. "I am come, citizens, before you," said this amiable son, "to implore the release of my mother; she is pining in the prison of Rouen, without having committed any offence; she is in years; and if her confinement continues, her children whose fortunes have been placed at the disposal of the national exigencies, will have to lament her death; grant the prayer of her son, restore, I conjure you, by all the rights of nature, restore her to her afflicted family." Robespierre looked obliquely at him, and with his accustomed sharpness, interrupted him from proceeding further, by exclaiming, "what right have _you_ to appear before us, miscreant? you are an agent of Pitt and Cobourg (the then common phrase of reproach) you shall be sent to the guillotine--Why are you not at the frontiers?" Monsieur G----, unappalled, replied, "give me my mother, and I will be there to morrow, I am ready instantly to spill my blood, if it must be the price of _her_ discharge." Robespierre, whose savage soul was occasionally moved by sights of heroic virtue, seemed impressed by this brave and unusual address. He paused, and after whispering a few words to his associates, wrote the discharge, and handing it over to a soldier, for the successful petitioner, he fiercely told him to retire.