Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1875-11-17

who we're governing France so madly at
the time, gave over this prince boy to
the care of shoemaker and his wife, to
whom they furnished a Judgement in
the prison for this purpose; and they.
did this in order, as they said, that the
bringing up of the boy might be as low
as that of the lowest Of the people. Poor
boy poor prince -.
A little later, Marie Antoinette, the
queen. was waa taken out Of her dun
geon to go to trial. They called it
trial, for the sake of decency; but I
thinkthey knew how it would end before
they called on her to appear. If the
Judges before whom she stood had said
she was innocent and must go free, I
am sure that the wives of the wine
sellers. and the fsh-women. and the
hags of Paris would have saatched her
away and carried her off to execution,
if they had not ssslain her with their
own bread-knives in the street.
These mad people had such a thirst
for blood !
1t was better, perhaps, that the judges
should say the Queen must De behead-
ed Gas they did,, than that these wild
women should cut her in pieces.
She certainly died an easier death by
the guillotine.
You do not know what the guillotine
is?
It is simply great knife sliding ir
Grooves between two upright posts
which by its fall sewers the head from
the body in an instant; and it is the
most humane way of executing capital
punishment there be any humanity
about it.
The machine was called Guillotine,
after DR.. Guillotin, who. in the French
Assembly in 1871, proposed better
way of cutting off peoples heads than
the old way of doing it by an axe;
which he said was clumsy way, and
clumsy headsmen sometimes made bad
work of it. But DR.. Guillotin was not
the inventor, as some books will tell
you; nor did he loose his own head by
it, as other books will tell you.
In 1892, the question of finding some
new way of execution was referred to
DR.. Antoine Louis, the Secretary of the
College of Surgeons, and he advised
by DIR. Guillotin the year before. So,
then they had machine made for trial
by one Schmidt, who was knife-maker.
And they tried it on a bo1y or two,
and found it worked so we'll that they
adopted it; and people called it at first
"Louisette. But DIR. Louis said ne
didn't invent it Or make it. (Webster's
Unabridged Dictionary, which is so
rarely wrong, makes mistake in saying
he did invent it,
So the people went back on the name
of Guillotin-al because poet of that
day had made some iingling rhymes,
IN which the honor had been referred
to him.
The real truth is, that machine like
it had been used III Italy, at Genoa,
two hundred years before; and in Eng
land, at Halifax, and in Scotland, at
Edinburgh, more than two hundred
years before. The Scotch people had
called it ''The Maiden"
It is dreadful machine, and does
very quick work, as [ know; for [
have myself seen mans head taken
Off by it; and never wish to see such
sight again.
And now, why do you suppose I have
run over this bloody bit of history ?
Only as sort of introduction to two of
your good friends-a man and woman,
who lived in Paris through all this time
of blood, and who yet have written the
two most charming and pleasant stories
for children that are anywhere to be
found in the French language.
You know them both in English.
Who the writer's were, and what the
stories were, [ must tell you some other
time.
Important from New York.