He was mistaken in himself, however.

He had led the fierce mobs of Paris to acts of bloodshed and violence, but in doing so he had only assisted with an eager hand in the overthrow of those who he thought were tyrannizing over the people.

He had stood by at the execution of a King, and ordered the drums to beat to drown the last words of the dying monarch; but the King had been condemned by those whom Santerre looked on as the wisest and best of the nation; and in acting as he had done, he had been carried on as well by ideas of duty as excitement.

He found his present a much more difficult task.

Indeed, after sitting still for some few minutes in that easy chair, meditating what he would do next, he found that the work which he had undertaken was one which he literally could not go through with.
"Is the old gentleman there ?" said he; and as he asked, the Marquis, with his eyes closed, and his hands crossed on his breast, was wheeled into the room.