The Reign of Terror _was_ over, at last! In a few days that became apparent. Exiles flocked back to the country. Prisons gave up their "suspects" to the number of ten thousand. Families were reunited, and people who had been existing miserably in all sorts of hiding-places, came out of their seclusion. Paris became a city of resurrected hopes and homes. On the morning of the Tenth Thermidor, Barras had made a tour of all the military posts of Paris, in the course of which he stopped at the Temple and inspected it. When he saw the condition in which poor little Louis XVII was kept in solitude, he was filled with pity, and announced that this must be improved, and that he would at once take steps to accomplish it. We will now see what the Tenth Thermidor brought to this unfortunate little monarch. Six months had passed since Louis Charles had been barred into his lonely cell. Not that he realised the time at all! One day dragged on wearily and gave place to the next, but he took no heed, and probably knew not whether his time of incarceration had been six months or as many years. It was the twenty-eighth of July, 1794. For three days the child had lain inert upon his bed. Life had become absolutely insupportable to him. At the very moment when he had been compelled to rise and take in his morning meal, wishing that they would send in no more food so that he might die the quicker, Robespierre and Simon were passing through the streets in a tumbril to their well-deserved reward. But he knew it not! That night the light of a candle shone through his wicket, and an unusually gentle voice called to him: "Capet! Little Capet! Are you there?" "Yes!" he answered feebly. "Can you not come here a moment?" the voice continued. But the boy was too weak to try, and too exhausted even to answer again. Then the light disappeared, and the gentle voice was silent. He passed the night in a feverish sleep. His poor limbs were wasted and thin, and great swellings on his knees and arms gave him unspeakable pain. No one would have recognised in him now even the pale captive of the cobbler, much less the beautiful boy of the Tuileries. Next morning he was called again, by many voices this time, but he could make no response at all. "He is dead!" he heard someone say. "Let us break down the door!" Forthwith, resounding blows rained on the barrier of his prison. When at length an entrance had been forced, several strange men entered.