ine, that the common acts of social intercourse may be explained
into intimacy, intimacy into the participation of imputed treasons, and
the fate of those with whom we are associated become our own. It appears
both useless and cruel to have brought us here, nor do I yet know any
reason why we were not all removed to Amiens, except it was to avoid
exposing to the eyes of the people in the places through which we must
pass too large a number of victims at once.--The cause of our being
removed from Peronne is indeed avowed, as it is at present a rule not to
confine people at the place of their residence, lest they should have too
much facility or communication with, or assistance from, their friends.*

* In some departments the nobles and priests arrested were removed
from ten to twenty leagues distant from their homes; and if they
happened to have relations living at the places where they were
confined, these last were forbidden to reside there, or even to
travel that way.

We should doubtless have remained at Arras until some change in public
affairs had procured our release, but for the fortunate discovery of the
man I have mentioned; and the trifling favour of removal from one prison
to another has been obtained only by certain arrangements which Fleury
has made with this subordinate agent of tyranny, and in which justice or
consideration for us had no share. Alas! are we not miserable? is not
the country miserable, when our only resource is in the vices of those
who govern?--It is uncertain when we shall be ordered from hence--it may
happen when we least expect it, even in the night, so that I shall not
attempt to write again till we have changed our situation. The risk is
at present too serious, and you must allow my desire of amusing you to
give way to my solicitude for my own preservation.

Bicetre at Amiens, Nov. 18, 1793.

_Nous voila donc encore, logees a la nation;_ that is to say, the common
prison of the department, amidst the thieves, vagabonds, maniacs, &c.
confined by the old police, and the gens suspects recently arrested by
the new.--I write from the end of a sort of elevated barn, sixty or
seventy feet long, where the interstices of the tiles admit the wind from
all quarters, and scarcely exclude the rain, and where an old screen and
some curtains only separate Mad. de ____, myself, and our servants, from
sixty priests, most of them old, sick, and as wretched as men c