Note 44 — Chapter XXXIII
Reading edition
The horrible tortures inflicted on the condemned man are accounted for by the fact that the executioner of Nantes had hidden or taken away his axe, and that his substitute was obliged to make use of unsuitable weapons: “They brought from the prisons of the town two men destined for the gibbet, one of whom played the part of executioner, while the other served as his assistant. But the former was so clumsy that, besides two blows with a Swiss sword, which had been purchased on the spot, he gave him [Chalais] thirty-four with an adze such as carpenters use, and was obliged to turn the body round to finish the severing of the head, the victim exclaiming up to the twentieth blow: ‘Jesus, Maria et Regina Coeli!’”