their power, or assailed their reputation; but the
lesser gentry, the merchants, or the shopkeepers, were very seldom
victims of arbitrary imprisonment--and I believe, amongst the evils which
it was the object of the revolution to redress, this (except on the
principle) was far from being of the first magnitude. I am not likely,
under my present circumstances, to be an advocate for the despotism of
any form of government; and I only give it as a matter of opinion, that
the civil liberty of the French was not so often and generally violated,*
as to influence their character in such a degree as to render them
insensible of its loss. At any rate, we must rank it among the
_bizarreries_ [Unaccountable whimsical events.] of this world, that the
French should have been prepared, by the theory of oppression under their
old system, for enduring the practice of it under the new one; and that
what during the monarchy was only possible to a few, is, under the
republic, almost certain to all.

* I remember in 1789, after the destruction of the Bastille, our
compassionate countrymen were taught to believe that this tremendous
prison was peopled with victims, and that even the dungeons were
inhabited; yet the truth is, though it would not have told so
pathetically, or have produced so much theatrical effect, there were
only seven persons confined in the whole building, and certainly not
one in the dungeons.

Amiens, Providence, Dec. 10, 1793.

We have again, as you will perceive, changed our abode, and that too
without expecting, and almost without desiring it. In my moments of
sullenness and despondency, I was not very solicitous about the
modifications of our confinement, and little disposed to be better
satisfied with one prison than another: but, heroics apart, external
comforts are of some importance, and we have, in many respects, gained by
our removal.

Our present habitation is a spacious building, lately a convent, and
though now crouded with more prisoners by two or three hundred than it
will hold conveniently, yet we are better lodged than at the Bicetre, and
we have also a large garden, good water, and, what above all is
desirable, the liberty of delivering our letters or messages ourselves
(in presence of the guard) to any one who will venture to approach us.
Mad. de ____ and myself have a small cell, where we have just room to
place our beds, but we have no fire-place, an