"You admit these deaths. You claim popular authority. Show us your warrant from any popular body, from any section, and you march from here unmolested."
Javogues, turning to his companions, said in a low tone: "Save yourselves. I remain." The two moved—but forward to his side.
The eyes of the assembly were on Goursac, who, white with the intensity of his passion, slowly stretched forth his finger:
"Well?" He waited a moment, his figure rigid in denunciation. "No answer? Then I pronounce, before this assembly, that you have lied! I here declare that what you have done is not the work of a judge, but of a murderer! That when you declared you acted by popular authority, you slandered the Nation, and tried to fasten on it the stain of your guilt and the odium of massacre!" Then assembling all his powers, he shouted at the top of his lungs, "Slanderer of the Nation!"
He turned to the section.
"Citoyens, these are the vipers that assail every life. No one of us is safe. They threaten the Assembly. They do not conceal their desire for its massacre. But to-night we hold one, this monster, this scum of the earth. We hold him, self-confessed and convicted. Citoyens, I declare to you we shall be guilty of cowardice if we now allow this monster to live another day!"
"Aye, to prison with them!"
"À la mort! À la mort!"
"À la guillotine!"