I might at least have looked for that show of respect to which the
unfortunate and friendless are entitled. Yet, on all the faces around
I saw nothing but a brutal and insolent curiosity. Girls of the lower
classes talked loudly of my looks and my youth. A large number of women
belonging to the nobility or moneyed classes displayed their brilliant
dresses in the galleries, as if they had come to some _fete_. A great
many monks showed their shaven crowns in the middle of the populace,
which they were inciting against me; from their crowded ranks I could
frequently catch the words "brigand," "ungodly," and "wild beast." The
men of fashion in the district were lolling on the seats of honour, and
discussing my passion in the language of the gutter. I saw and heard
everything with that tranquility which springs from a profound disgust
of life; even as a traveller who has come to the end of his journey, may
look with indifference and weariness on the eager bustle of those who
are setting off for a more distant goal.

The trial began with that emphatic solemnity which at all times has
been associated with the exercise of judicial power. My examination was
short, in spite of the innumerable questions that were asked me about
my whole life. My answers singularly disappointed the expectations
of public curiosity, and shortened the trial considerably. I confined
myself to three principal replies, the substance of which I never
changed. Firstly, to all questions concerning my childhood and
education, I replied that I had not come into the defendant's dock to
accuse others. Secondly, to those bearing on Edmee, the nature of my
feeling for her, and my relations with her, I replied that Mademoiselle
de Mauprat's worth and reputation could not permit even the simplest
question as to the nature of her relations with any man whatever; and
that, as to my feelings for her, I was accountable for them to no one.
Thirdly, to those which were designed to make me confess my pretended