Now Paris had been a friend of Danton
and took his condemnation to heart. He even declined to sign the
judgment, which it was his duty to do. The next day, when he presented
himself to Fouquier, Fouquier looked at him sourly, and observed, "We
don't want men who reason here; we want business done." The following
morning Paris did not appear. His friends were disturbed, but he was not
to be found. He had been cast into a secret dungeon in the prison of the
Luxembourg.
So, if a man were too rich it might go hard with him.
Louis-Philippe-Joseph, Duc d'Orleans, afterward known as Egalite, was
one of the most interesting figures among the old nobility. The
great-great-great-grandson of Louis XIII, he was a distant cousin of
Louis XVI, and ranked as the first noble of France beyond the royal
family. His education had been unfortunate. His father lived with a
ballet-dancer, while his mother, the Princess Henriette de
Bourbon-Conti, scandalized a society which was not easily shocked.
During the Terror the sans culottes everywhere averred that the Duke was
the son of a coachman in the service of the banker Duruet.
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