"Peregrinations of the Guillotine."

Professor de Sumichrast's last lecture on "Paris during the Reign of Terror" was given in the Fogg Lecture Room last evening. The subject was "The Peregrinations of the Guillotine." Professor Sumichrast began by explaining the various ways in which the old monarchical government inflicted the death penalty. The invention of the guillotine, which in some analogous form had already been used in Germany and in Scotland, happened to coincide with the outbreak of the Revolution, and was not a consequence of that movement. But it was certainly singular that the invention should have taken place at that particular time, since it enabled executions to be conducted with a rapidity and a certainty which would have been impossible with the means formerly at the disposal of the law.

The lecturer gave a detailed account of the manner of preparing the condemned for the scaffold, from the moment when they had heard their death sentence in the hall where sat the Revolutionary Tribunal up to the time when the victims were made to ascend the cart waiting at the gate of the Conciergerie. The itinerary followed by these carts on their way to the scaffold can readily be traced along the existing streets of the French metropolis.

The various places where the guillotine was erected were then described. The scaffold was first set up in the Place de Greve, whence it was transported to the Place de la Revolution, then to the Place du Carrousel, and again back to the Place de la Revolution. Later, in deference to the objections raised by the business men on the streets leading to the spot, it was moved to the east end of the city.

A great extension of graveyards was rendered necessary by the appalling number of victims, particularly of the cemetery of the Errancis, that of the Madeline, and the cemetery of Picpus where were interred the remains of the fifteen hundred, persons who perished on the Place du Trone. The location of this cemetery remained a mystery until after the Restoration.

The lecture, like the three preceding ones, was fully illustrated by reproductions of contemporary engravings and sketches, and plans of the various places described.