"Now, give us the keys of
your closets;" they want to be sure that there are no fleur-de-lys or
other illegal articles. They search the old man's pockets, take his
keys, and, to dispatch business, break into the chests and seize or
carry off all the plate, "twenty-six table-dishes, three soup-ladles,
three goblets, two snuff-boxes, forty counters, two watches, another
gold watch and a gold cross." "We will draw up a proc?s-verbal of all
this at our leisure in Meaux. Now, where's your silver? If you don't
say where it is, the guillotine is outside and I will be your
executioner." The old man yields and merely requests to be untied.
But it is better to keep him bound, "so as to make him 'sing.' " They
carry him into the kitchen and "put his feet into a heated brazier."
He shouts with pain, and indicates another chest which they break open
and then carry off what they find there, "seventy-two francs in coin
and five or six thousand livres in assignats, which Gibbon had just
received for the requisitions made on him for corn." Next, they break
open the cellar doors, set a cask of vinegar running, carry wine
upstairs, eat the family meal, get drunk and, at last, clear out,
leaving Gibbon with his feet burnt, and garroted, as well as the other
eleven members of his household, quite certain that there will be no
pursuit.
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