On fut au moment de, they were on the point of, etc

1. 3. Chénier le poète. Marie Joseph de Chénier (1764 — 1811) managed to live through the Révolution by shewing very little consistencyj a second-class writer and a despicable politician.

1. 5. malgré tout ce qu^on peut reprocher à sa vie. Chénier took, on the republican side, an active share in ail the events which occurred between 1792 and 1802.

1. 7. du talent dramatique. Chénier composed the following tragédies : Charles IX (1789), Henry VIII, La mort de Calas (1791), Gracchus (1792), Fénelon (1793), Timoléon (1794).