A confused and distant hum, swelling and falling at intervals, now filled the air, and gradually I could distinguish the shouts of people at a distance. This increased as it came nearer; and then I heard the tramping noise of many feet, and of a great multitude of people passing in the street below, and suddenly a wild cheer broke forth, “Vive le Consul!” “Vive Bonaparte!” followed the next instant by the clanking sound of a cavalry escort, while the cry grew louder and louder, and the vivas drowned all other sounds. “You hear them, Guillaume, you hear them,” said the sailor to the other prisoner; “That shout is our death-cry. Bonaparte comes not here to-day but to see his judges do his bidding.” “What care I?” said the other, fiercely. “The guillotine or the sabre, the axe or the bayonet,--it is all one. We knew what must come of it.” The door opened as he spoke, and a greffier of the tribunal appeared with four gendarmes. “Come, Messieurs,” said he, “the court is waiting for you.” “And how go matters without, sir?” said the elder, in an easy tone. “Badly for the prisoners,” said the greffier, shaking his head. “Monsieur Moreau, the general's brother, has done much injury; he has insulted the Consul.” “Bravely done!” cried the younger man, with enthusiasm. “It is well he should hear truth one day, though the tongue that uttered it should be cold the next.” “Move on, sir!” said the greffier, sternly. “Not you,” added he, as I pressed forward after the rest; “your time has not come.” “Would that it had!” said I, as the door closed upon me, and I was left in total solitude. The day was over, and the evening already late, when a turnkey appeared, and desired me to follow him. A moody indifference to everything had settled on me, and I never spoke as I walked behind him down corridor after corridor; and across a court, into a large, massive-looking building, whose grated windows and strongly-barred doors reminded me of the Temple. “Here is your cell,” said he, roughly, as he unlocked a low door near the entrance. “It is gloomy enough,” said I, with a sad smile. “And yet many have shed tears to leave it before now,” rejoined he, with a savage twinkle of his small eyes. I was glad when the hoarse crash of the closed door told me I was alone; and I threw myself upon my bed and buried my face in my hands.