from M. de Foucault, asking him, “where are your troops? in which direction will they enter Paris?  I should like to be employed among them.”  Favras was condemned to make the ‘amende honorable’ in front of the Cathedral, and to be hanged at the Place de Greve.  He heard this sentence with wonderful calmness, and said to his judges, “I pity you much if the testimony of two men is sufficient to induce you to condemn.”  The judge having said to him, “I have no other consolation to hold out to you than that which religion affords,” he replied, nobly, “My greatest consolation is that which I derive from my innocence.”—­“Biographic Universelle”]

On the morning of the Sunday following this execution M. de la Villeurnoy came to my house to tell me that he was going that day to the public dinner of the King and Queen to present Madame de Favras and her son, both of them in mourning for the brave Frenchman who fell a sacrifice for his King; and that all the royalists expected to see the Queen load the unfortunate family with favours.  I did all that lay in my power to prevent this proceeding.  I foresaw the effect it would have upon the Queen’s feeling heart, and the painful constraint she would experience, having the horrible Santerre, the commandant of a battalion of the Parisian guard, behind her chair during dinner-time.  I could not make M. de la Villeurnoy comprehend my argument; the Queen was gone to mass, surrounded by her whole Court, and I had not even means of apprising her of his intention.

When dinner was over I heard a knocking at the door of my apartment, which opened into the corridor next that of the Queen; it was herself.  She asked me whether there was anybody with me; I was alone; she threw herself into an armchair, and told me she came to weep with me over the foolish conduct of the ultras of the King’s party.  “We must fall,” said she, “attacked as we are by men who possess every talent and shrink from no crime, while we are defended only by those who are no doubt very estimable, but have no adequate idea of our situation.  They have exposed me to the animosity of both parties by presenting the widow and son of Favras to me.  Were I free to act as I wish, I should take the child of the man who has just sacrificed himself for us and place him at table between the King and myself; but surrounded by the assassins who have destroyed his father, I did not dare even to cast my eyes upon him.  The royalists will blame me for not having appeared interested in this poor child; the revolutionists will be enraged at the idea that his presentation should have been thought agreeable to me.”  However, the Queen added that she knew Madame de Favras was in want, and that she desired me to send her next day, through a person who could be relied on, a few rouleaus of fifty Louis, and to direct that she should be assured her Majesty would always watch over the fortunes of herself and her son.