Glasgow Courier. — 1853-03-26 (Glasgow, Strathclyde, Scotland)

XVI., I spoke to the Abbe Kearney more than once. His replies were brief, and were accompanied by evidence that the subject caused him much pain. The following simple narrative is all that I could obtain from him. I arrived,' said he, 'in the Place de la Revolution before the King, and managed to reach the scaffold just as the carriage in which he sat with the I Abbe Edgeworth and two gendarmes approached from the Rue Royale. The front ranks of the crowd which I surrounded the scaffold were principally mut-culottes, who evinced the most savage joy in anticipation of the impending tragedy. The scaffold Was so situated as to provide for the royal sufferer a pang to which leas distinguished victims were insensible. It stood between the pedestal on which had been erected a statue of Louis XV., overthrown early in the Revolution,* and I the issue from the garden of theTuileries,called the Pont Tournant. Midway between those two points &hideous statue of liberty raised her Gorgon head. This situation I was chosen in order torealisea conception characteristic Of the epoch and the frantic fiends who figured in it. It sewed that the unhappy persons, on being placed on the kticede of the guillotine, should in their descent from the perpendicular to the horizontal, when pushed home to receive the fatal stroke, make an obeisance to the godden ! Yea, even to that frivolity in a matter no appalling did the monsters directing those butcheries resort. For the King this position of the guillotine was therefore peculiarly painful, for, looking beyond the statue of Liberty the Palace of the Tuileries appeared at the end of Use grand avenue, and upon it his last glance in this world must have ,rested. Scarcely had the King descended when Samson, the executioner, and his aids approached him to make his toilette,t as the preparation of the victim for death WU termed. He had a large head of hair, confined by a ribbon according to the fashion of the day. Upon this Samson seised with one hand, brandishing a pair of huge scissors in the other. The King, whine hands were yet free, opposed the attempt of Samson to cut off his hair, a precaution necessary, however, to ensure the operation of the axe. The executioner's assistants rushed upon him. He struggled with them violently and long, but was at length overcome and bound. His hair was cut off in a mass and thrown upon the ground. It was picked up by an Englishman who was in front of the scaffold, and who put it in his pocket, to the scandal of the sass-culottes. who like him were in the first. rank of spectators. As we never heard more about the circumstance I suppose this person was murdered. When the bustle occasioned by this incident was over the King ascended the scaffold. All that followed with .regard to him is well known.' 'ls It not true, Abbe? said I, 'that the Abbe Edgeworth uttered, as the King was mounting the short flight of steps leading to the scaffold, those sublime words of encouragement—" File de Saint Louis, montee au oiel I " 'No,' he replied; 'but while the King was struggling with the executioner and his men, as I have just described, the Abbe I Edgeworth recommended resignation to him, adding (and these words suggested possibly the phrase ascribed to him)—" You have only one sacrifice:more to make in this life before you enjoy life eternal—submit to it." The execution over, the Abbe Edgeworth and I were advised to withdraw as quickly as possible. I suppose , the illustrious Malesherbes was present to take a last farewell of his royal master and client, for the cloak of , his coachman was obtained and cast round Edgeworth, under favour of which he retired. Nevertheless he must have been pursued, for he found it necessary to take refuge in a little milliner's shop, in the Rue du Bar, whence by aback door he made his escape.' 'And you P reached home safely, but was subsequently arrested, and passed three years in the Temple.' This account of IM execution of Louis