'Stop, stop, scoundrel, you are running off!' He draws his saber and seizes me by the collar; I am dragged and borne along by him and his men.

'I have hold of him, I have hold of him!' he exclaims, and, indeed, he did hold me with his teeth, legs, and arms, like a madman.

At last, 'scoundrel, monster, bastard,' says he, 'are you a marquis ?' 'No,' I replied, 'I am a sans-culotte.' 'Ah, well people, you hear what he says,' he exclaims, 'he says that he is a sans-culotte, and that is the way he greets a denunciation on the maximum! I remove him.

Let him be kicked in prison!'"[32123] It is certain that the King of Arras and Cambray is not far from a raging fever; with such symptoms an ordinary individual would be sent to an asylum.
Not so vain, less fond of parading his royalty, but more savage and placed in Nantes amidst greater dangers, Carrier, under the pressure of more somber ideas, is much more furious and constant in his madness.
Sometimes his attacks reach hallucination.

"I have seen him," says a witness, "so carried away in the tribune, in the heat of his harangue when trying to overrule public opinion, as to cut off the tops of the candles with his saber," as if they were so many aristocrats' heads.[32124] Another time, at table, after having declared that France could not feed its too numerous population, and that it was decided to cut down the excess, all nobles, magistrates, priests, merchants, etc., he becomes excited and exclaims, "Kill, kill!" as if he were already engaged in the work and ordering the operation.[32125] Even when fasting, and in an ordinary condition, he is scarcely more cooled down.