Let me consider what time generally elapses between the condemnation and the execution of a prisoner.
Three days of delay, after sentence is pronounced, for the prisoner’s final plea to annul it.
The plea forgotten for a week in a Court of Assize, before it is sent to the Minister; a fortnight forgotten at the Minister’s, who does not even know that there are such papers, although he is supposed to transmit them, after examination, to the “Cour de Cassation.”
Then classification, numbering, registering; the guillotine-list is loaded, and none must go before their turn! A fortnight more waiting; then the Court assembles, rejects twenty pleas together, and sends all back to the Minister, who sends them back to the Attorney-General, who sends them back to the executioner; this would take three more days.
On the morning of the fourth day the Deputies of the Attorney-General and Recorder prepare the order of execution; and the following morning, from day-break, is heard the noise of erecting the scaffold, and in the cross-streets a commotion of hoarse voices.
Altogether six weeks. The young girl’s calculation was right! I have now been at least five weeks (perhaps six, for I dare not reckon) in this fatal prison; nay, I think I have been even three days more.