Gazette Of The United States

Extract of a letter from Paris, April 25.

A robber and assassin was this day the first to experience the fatal effect of the new machine for the execution of criminals. He was securely bound to an upright pillar, which turning upon a hinge laid him in a horizontal position with his head in a kind of aperture like that of a pillory. The boards that confined his head were double to admit between them a blade of enormous weight, which rushing down upon an inclined plane divided the neck with certain and instantaneous effect, and no doubt without much sensation of pain to the sufferer. A basket placed before him received the head; the bleeding trunk was again erected, and both were immediately sent away. Though there is something awful in this punishment, the populace who coolly discussed its merits, said "they should relish it better than hanging."

The honor of the invention being due to M. Guillotin, physician, political writer, and a distinguished member of the first assembly, it is universally called the Guillotine. Could his modesty, however, have foreseen that he should go by this road to immortality, it is much to be doubted whether he would have availed himself of the versatility of his talents.