The zenith of French glory; - the pinnacle of liberty / Js. Gy. desn. et fect. - pro bono publico.

On the level of the eye, but high above a square in which the guillotine is at work, bodies dangle from lamp-brackets projecting from the wall of a high building on the right. A bishop in his robes and two monks, their hands tied, hang close together from the horizontal bar. On the lantern sits a ragged, bare-legged sansculotte playing a fiddle, looking down with smiling triumph at the crowd; he is in back view, his bony right foot planted on the head of the dead bishop. The high scaffold is surrounded by a sea of bonnets-rouges, waving exultantly as the guillotine falls on Louis XVI. A ragged and grinning sansculotte hauls at the wheel which releases the blade (on which is a crown). From the guillotine flies a tricolour flag inscribed 'Vive l'Égalité. Ragged sansculottes holding spears stand on the scaffold. The windows of the adjoining houses are crowded with spectators.