ill at last Gerald was the oldest _detenu_ in the section
of 'L'Opinion.'

The fatuous vacuity of his mind was such that though he heard the voices
around him, and even tried at times to follow what they said, he could
collect nothing of it: sometimes the sounds would simply seem to weary
and fatigue him--they acted as some deep monotonous noise might have
done on a tired brain; sometimes they would cause the most intense
irritation, exciting him to a sense of anger he could with difficulty
control; and at others, again, they would overcome him so thoroughly
with sorrow, that he would weep for hours. How time passed, what he had
himself been in former years, where and how and with whom he lived, only
recurred to him in short fitful passages, like the scenes of some moving
panorama, present for a moment and then lost to view. He would fancy,
too, that he had many distinct and separate existences, as many deaths;
and then marvel to himself in which of these states he was at that
moment.

His wild talk; his absurd answers when questioned; the incoherent things
he would say, stamped him among his fellow-prisoners as one bereft of
reason; nor was there, to all seeming, much injustice in the suspicion.
If the chance mention of some name he once knew would start and arouse
him, his very observations would appear those of a wandering intellect,
since he seemed to have been acquainted with persons the most
opposite and incongruous; and it even became a jest--a sort of prison
'plaisanterie'--to ask him whether he was not intimate with this man or
that, mentioning persons the least likely for him ever to have met.

'There goes another of your friends, Maitre,' said one to him: 'they
have guillotined Brissot this morning; you surely knew him, he edited
the _Droit du Peuple_.'

'Yes, I knew him. Poor Brissot!' said Gerald, with a sigh.

'What was he like, Maitre? was he short and thick, with a beard like
mine?'

'No, he was fair and gentle-looking.'

'_Parbleu!_ that was a good guess: so he was.'

'And kind-hearted as he looked,' muttered Gerald.

'He died with Gaudet, Gensonne, Louvet, and four other Maratists. You
have seen most of them, I 'm sure.'

'Yes. Gaudet and Gensonne I remember; I forget Louvet. Had he a scar on
his temple?'

'That he had; it was a sabre-cut in a duel,' cried one, who added in a
whisper, 'he's not the mad fool you take him for.'

'You used to be Gabriel Riquetti in times past?' asked anothe