Three departments, the Oise, the Pas-de-Calais, and the Puy-de-Dome, each chose him for its representative. He accepted the honor from Calais and proceeded to Paris. His entry into the French capital was a triumphal one. He was received as a hero,--an intellectual hero who on the field of mental combat had vanquished Europe's most brilliant champion of monarchy, and vindicated before the tribunal of the world mankind's eternal rights. He took his seat in the National Convention. A stupendous task devolved upon this body--the formation of a new Constitution for Republican France. Its most illustrious statesmen and its wisest legislators must be chosen to prepare it. A committee of nine was named: Thomas Paine, Danton, Condorcet, Brissot, Barrere, Vergniaud, Petion, Gensonne, and the Abbe Sieyes. To Paine and Condorcet chiefly was the work of drafting it assigned by their colleagues. Then came the trial of Louis XVI and the beginning of those turbulent scenes which culminated in the Reign of Terror. The convention was clamoring for blood. Paine had been one of the foremost in overthrowing the monarchy. He believed the king to have been tyrannical,--to have been the pliant tool of a corrupt nobility, and of a still more corrupt priesthood. But he did not deem him deserving of death, nor did he believe that the best interests of France would be subserved by such harsh measures. But the Terrorists threatened with vengeance all who should dare to oppose them. To plead the cause of the king might be to share his fate. A vote by any member in favor of saving his life might bring an overwhelming vote against that member's own life. They had resolved that the king should die, and led by such men as Robespierre and Marat, there were assembled the most determined and the most dangerous men of France. The galleries, too, were filled with an excited mob of fifteen hundred--many of them hired assassins, fresh from the September massacre. "We vote," protested Lanjuinais when the balloting commenced, "under the daggers and the cannon of the factions." In this perilous position what course would Paine pursue? Would he, like others, quietly acquiesce in these unjust proceedings? He had never yet faltered in his purpose of pursuing what he deemed the right. Would he shrink from danger now? No! above the wild storm of that enraged assembly, through his interpreter, rose the voice of this brave man in powerful, eloquent appeals in behalf of mercy. "Destroy the King," in effect, he said, "but save the man! Strike the crown, but spare the heart!" He pleads in vain; the king must die. "Death within four-and-twenty hours," is the decree. Amid the insults and execrations of a frenzied mob Louis is torn from the arms of his queen and children and hurried to the scaffold.