Such men are to me accursed--their breath reeks of human blood." Eleanor shuddered as she listened to him: but it was not the thought of all the blood, which he whom she loved had shed, which made her shudder: she had no idea that Robespierre was a sanguinary man: she sympathized with the weakness of humanity which he confessed, and loved him for the kindness of his heart--and he was not a hypocrite in his protestation; he believed that there was nothing in common between himself and the wretches who crowded round the last sufferings of the victims whom he had caused to ascend the scaffold.

He little thought that, in a few years, he would be looked upon as the sole author of the barbarities of which he now complained.
It was seldom that Robespierre had spoken so openly to Eleanor Duplay of his inmost thoughts.

She was flattered and gratified to think he had thought her worthy of his confidence, that he had chosen her to listen to the secrets of his heart, and she felt that, if she had influence with him, it would become her as a woman to use it on behalf of those whom it might be in his power to save from a fearful death.
"And are there many more who must die ?" said she.

"When I hear the wheels of that horrid cart, as it carries the poor creatures who have been condemned, on their last journey, my heart, too, sickens within me.
Will these horrid executions go on much longer ?" "There are still thousands upon thousands of men in France, who would sooner be the slaves of a King, than draw the breath of liberty," answered he.
"But they can be taught the duties and feelings of men, cannot they?
They think, and feel now only as they have been brought up to think and feel." "Had they not been too stubborn to learn, they have had a lesson written in letters of blood, which would have long since convinced them--if it be necessary, it must be repeated I for one will not shrink from my duty.

No though I should sink beneath the horrid task which it imposes on me." They both then sat silent for a while; though Robespierre had ventured to express to the girl, whom he knew to be so entirely devoted to him, a feeling somewhat akin to that of pity for his victims, he could not bear that even she should appear to throw a shadow of an imputation on the propriety and justness of his measures, although she only did so by repeating and appealing to the kindly expressions which had fallen from himself.