IT WAS pure Titus Andronicus.
The National Front (FN) leader, Mr Jean-Marie Le Pen, walked on to the stage carrying on a platter the guillotined head of the Socialist candidate and mayor of Strasbourg, Mrs Catherine Trautmann.
The cardboard-backed photograph of her face and carefully groomed hair looked disturbingly like the real thing; her severed neck was swathed in bright red. Is there no limit to Mr Le Pen's bad taste?
Mrs Trautmann has been Mr Le Pen's bete noire since she organised a 60,000-strong march against the FN last March.
With obvious delight, Mr Le Pen then read off his list of "prohibitions and indulgences", singling out 13 centre-right candidates and three Socialists to vote against in the second round. The list was drawn up, he explained, according to the FN's policies on European integration (he is against it), priority for French people in jobs and housing (he demands it) and animosity shown towards his party.
The FN leader told his followers that he knew they were "impatient to know the length of the carrot and the weight of the stick" that he would use against political opponents. "There will be a little carrot but a big stick," he said as the crowd laughed.
Mr Le Pen (69) was at it again yesterday morning, campaigning on behalf of his daughter, Marie-Caroline, who is a candidate in the depressed town of Mantes-la-Jolie, north of Paris.
After his severed-head stunt of the previous evening, 200 Socialists came to demonstrate against him. For the second time in the campaign, fighting broke out between left-wing supporters and FN supporters. Mr Le Pen joined in the punch-up himself, violently pushing Ms Annelle Peulvast-Bergeal, the Socialist candidate, against a wall. Pursued by demonstrators throwing eggs and pebbles, Mr Le Pen was forced to retreat into a cafe before making his escape. Asked why he had used force against a woman, Mr Le Pen said that Ms Peulvast-Bergeal "should not have been standing with the demonstrators."
The extraordinary incident, in which Mr Le Pen cursed demonstrators, was seen across France on the evening television news.
