the projector ashamed of it.[98] Robespierre, rather fiend than man, now ruled the destinies of France.  On the 7th of July, 1794, Mercier happened to be passing along the streets when he saw sixty-seven human beings about to undergo the butchery of the GUILLOTINE.  Every avenue was crowded by spectators—­who were hurrying towards the horrid spectacle.  Mercier was carried along by the torrent; but, having just strength enough to raise his head, he looked up ... and beheld his old and intimate friend the ex-abbe ROGER ... in the number of DEVOTED VICTIMS!  That sight cost him his life.  A sudden horror ... followed by alternate shiverings, and flushings of heat ... immediately seized him.  A cold perspiration hung upon his brow.  He was carried into the house of a stranger.  His utterance became feeble and indistinct, and it seemed as if the hand of death were already upon him.

Yet he rallied awhile.  His friends came to soothe him.  Hopes were entertained of a rapid and perfect recovery.  He even made a few little visits to his friends in the vicinity of Paris.  But ... his fine full figure gradually shrunk:  the colour as gradually deserted his cheek—­and his eye sensibly lacked that lustre which it used to shed upon all around.  His limbs became feeble, and his step was both tremulous and slow.  He lingered five years ... and died at ten at night, on the 13th of May 1799, just upon the completion of his jubilee of his bibliographical toil.  What he left behind, as annotations, both in separate papers, and on the margins of books, is prodigious.  M. Barbier shewed me his projected third edition of the Supplement to Marchand, and a copy of the Bibliotheque Francoise of De La Croix du Maine, &c. covered, from one end to the other, with marginal notes by him.[99] That amiable biographer also gave me one of his little bibliographical notices, as a specimen of his hand writing and of his manner of pursuing his enquiries.[100]

Such are the feelings, and such the gratifications; connected with a view of the LIBRARY of STE. GENEVIEVE.  Whenever I visit it, I imagine that the gentle spirit of MERCIER yet presides there; and that, as it is among the most ancient, so is it among the most interesting, of BOOK LOCALS in Paris.

Come away with me, now, to a rival collection of books—­in the MAZARINE COLLEGE, or Institute.  Of the magnificence of the exterior of this building I have made mention in a previous letter.  My immediate business is with the interior; and more especially with that portion of it which relates to paper and print.  You are to know, however, that this establishment contains two Libraries; one, peculiar to the Institute, and running at right angles with the room in which the members of that learned body assemble:  the other, belonging to the College, to the left, on entering the first square—­from the principal front.