Page:Ninety-three.djvu/356

 Gauvain remained silent for a moment, and, as it were, collecting his thoughts.

Cimourdain spoke again.

"What have you to say in your defence?"

Gauvain slowly raised his head, without looking at anybody, and replied:—

"This: one thing prevented me from seeing any other; a good action, seen too near, concealed a hundred criminal actions from my eyes; on one side an old man, on the other, children, all this came between me and duty. I forgot the villages burned, the fields ravaged, the prisoners massacred, the wounded murdered, the women shot. I forgot France betrayed to England; I liberated the murderer of his country. I am guilty. In speaking thus, I seem to speak against myself; it is a mistake. I am speaking for myself. When the guilty person confesses his fault, he saves the only thing worth the trouble of saving—honor."

"Is this," replied Cimourdain, "all that you have to say for your defence?"

"I will add that being the chief, I owe an example, and that you, for your part, being the judge, owe one too."

"What example do you demand?"

"My death."

"Do you think it just?"

"And necessary."

"Be seated."

The quartermaster, as commissioner-auditor, rose and gave a reading; first of the sentence, which outlawed the ci-devant Marquis de Lantenac; secondly, the decree of the Convention inflicting punishment of death on any one aiding the escape of a rebel prisoner. It ended with some lines printed at the bottom of the notice of the decree, forbidding any one "to carry aid and assistance" to the above-named rebel "under pain of death," and signed,—

Having finished these readings, the commissioner-auditor sat down again.

Cimourdain folded his arms and said,—

"Accused, pay attention. Audience, listen, look, and be silent. You have the law before you. It will now be