His stockings, like his shirt, were snow-white, and the silver buckles shone brightly in his shoes.

No one could have looked less like a French republican of 1793 than did Robespierre.
He had just completed a letter addressed jointly to Thurreau and Lechelle, the commissioners whom he had newly appointed to the horrid task of exterminating the royalists of La Vendee.

Santerre had undertaken this work, and had failed in it, and it was now said that he was a friend and creature of Danton's; that he was not to be trusted as a republican; that he had a royalist bias; that it would be a good thing that his head should roll, as the heads of so many false men had rolled, under the avenging guillotine.

Poor Santerre, who, in the service of the Republic, had not shunned the infamy of presiding at the death of Louis.
He, however, contrived to keep his burly head on his strong shoulders, and to brew beer for the Directory, the Consulate, and the Empire.
Thurreau and Lechelle, it was correctly thought, would be surer hands at performing the work to be done.

They had accepted the commission with alacrity, and were now on the road to commence their duties.