In  vain  had  the  devoted,  the  talented,  the  enthusiastic,  but
rash  and  precipitate  Camille,  appealed  to  the  Convention  in
behalf  of  his  incarcerated  friend ;  in  vain  had  he  dwelt  upon
the  services  rendered  by  Dillon  to  France ;    in  vain  had  he


ABROAD   AND    AT    HOME.  153

with  indignation  repelled  and  repudiated  the  incredible  crimes
attributed  to  him ;  in  vain  had  he  with  irony  and  sarcasm
rebutted  the  accusation,  that  Dillon  was  compromised  in  "  a
plot,  which  had  for  its  objects  the  overthrow  of  the  Republic,
to  seize  upon  the  principal  military  posts  (those  of  the  arsenal
and  the  Pont  Neuf  especially),  to  arrest  and  egorger  the
patriotic  members  of  the  Convention,  and  of  the  Committees
of  Public  and  of  General  Safety ;  and  finally,  to  tear  out  their
hearts,  roast,  and  then  devour  them  ?"*

On  these  absurd  charges    Dillon  and  his  fellow-prisoners
were  brought  to  trial,  if  trial  it  could  be  termed,  for  in  every
case  conviction  and  execution  followed  accusation  as  matters  of
•     course.
Unfortunately  it  would  appear  that  there  had  been  in  the
prison  a  project  on  foot  for  sending  a  thousand  crowns  and  a
letter  to  the  wife  of  Camille.  One  of  the  prisoners,  the  base
and  cowardly  Laflotte,  hoping  to  obtain  life  and  liberty  by  de-
nouncing a  plot,  ran  to  the  keeper  of  the  Luxembourg  and
drew  up  a  declaration,  in  which  he  described  a  conspiracy  about
to  break  out  within  and  without  the  prisons,  to  rescue  the
accused  and  assassinate  the  members  of  the  two  committees.
