# Paris: September, 1792 explained — The Scarlet Pimpernel > Chapter companion for The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy. ## What happens The chapter opens in Paris during the Reign of Terror, depicting the bloodlust of the crowd and the daily executions by guillotine. Sergeant Bibot guards the West Barricade, boasting of his skill at unmasking aristocrats attempting to flee. Rumors spread of a mysterious Englishman, the Scarlet Pimpernel, who daringly rescues royalists. Bibot recounts the tale of Sergeant Grospierre's fatal blunder, and as the gates prepare to close, he examines the market carts, wary of being tricked. ## Themes in this chapter ### Revolution and Tyranny The chapter vividly portrays the brutal excesses of the French Revolution, where the guillotine becomes a tool of vengeance and the crowd revels in bloodshed. ### Class and Social Hierarchy The aristocracy is systematically targeted for destruction, with former nobles forced to disguise themselves to escape the vengeance of the lower classes. ### Secrecy and Trust The Scarlet Pimpernel operates in secrecy, using disguise and deception to outwit the authorities, while Bibot's trust in his own vigilance is contrasted with Grospierre's fatal gullibility. ## Character check-ins ### Sergeant Bibot The sergeant in command at the West Barricade, proud of his zeal in capturing aristocrats and contemptuous of his comrade Grospierre's failure. ### Citoyen Grospierre The sergeant at the North Gate who was executed for allowing the Duc de Chalis and his family to escape, tricked by the Scarlet Pimpernel. ### Foucquier-Tinville President of the Committee of Public Safety, who receives mysterious notes signed with the Scarlet Pimpernel device. ### Robespierre Mentioned as one who commended Bibot for his zeal in capturing aristocrats. ## Key lines > A surging, seething, murmuring crowd, of beings that are human only in name, for to the eye and ear they seem naught but savage creatures, animated by vile passions and by the lust of vengeance and of hate. The crowd is described as a chaotic, animalistic mass driven by a thirst for revenge and cruelty. _Sets the tone of the chapter, emphasizing the dehumanizing effect of revolutionary violence._ > The hour, some little time before sunset, and the place, the West Barricade, at the very spot where, a decade later, a proud tyrant raised an undying monument to the nation’s glory and his own vanity. The scene is the West Barricade, where later Napoleon would build a monument to his own ego. _Foreshadows the rise of Napoleon and contrasts revolutionary ideals with future tyranny._ > Bibot would look at his prey as a cat looks upon the mouse, play with him, sometimes for quite a quarter of an hour, pretend to be hoodwinked by the disguise... Bibot toys with captured aristocrats, pretending to be fooled before revealing their true identities. _Illustrates Bibot's cruelty and the crowd's entertainment at the expense of the fugitives._ > The paper always contained a brief notice that the band of meddlesome Englishmen were at work, and it was always signed with a device drawn in red—a little star-shaped flower, which we in England call the Scarlet Pimpernel. The Scarlet Pimpernel leaves a note with a red flower symbol to announce his rescues. _Introduces the iconic symbol of the Scarlet Pimpernel and his audacious defiance._ ## Links - HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/the_scarlet_pimpernel_se/chapters/i-paris-september-1792 - Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/the_scarlet_pimpernel_se - All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/the_scarlet_pimpernel_se/chapters