When persons by scores were to be
taken out of prison for the guillotine, it was always done in the
night, and those who performed that office had a private mark by which
they knew what rooms to go to and what number to take. We, as I have
said, were four, and the door of our room was marked, unobserved by us,
with that number in chalk; but it happened, if happening is a proper
word, that the mark was put on when the door was open and flat against
the wall, and thereby came on the inside when we shut it at night, and
the destroying angel passed by it." Paine thought his escape
providential; the Orthodox took a different view of it.
After the fall of Robespierre, in Thermidor, seventy-three members of
the Convention, who had survived the Reign of Terror, resumed their
seats. But Paine was not released. Monroe had superseded Morris in
August, but had no instructions from his government. Indeed, as Paine
had accepted citizenship in France, and had publicly acted as a French
citizen, it was considered, even by his friends, that he had no claim
to the protection of the United States.
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