e, under
suspicion, and till further evidence could be adduced against me.

It was clear that either they greatly doubted of my guilt, or were
disposed to regard me as very slightly implicated, for I was not
confined in a cell or with the other prisoners, but accommodated with
a room in the jailer's own apartment, and received as a guest at his
table.

I was not only treated with kindness and attention here, but with a
degree of candor that amazed me. The daily papers were freely
placed before me, and I read how a well-known member of the "French
Convention," popularly called Couvre-Tete, but styling himself the Count
de Gabriac, had been brought up before the magistrates under a charge
of a grave description, which, for the ends of justice, had been
investigated with closed doors. Several others were in custody for their
implication in the same charge, it was added, and great hopes maintained
that the guilty parties would be made amenable to the law.

Mr. Holt, the jailer, spoke of all the passing events of the day freely
in my presence, and discussed the politics and position of France, and
the condition of parties, with all the ease of old intimacy between us.
At first, I half suspected this to be a mere artifice to lure me on to
some unguarded expression, or even some frank admission about myself;
but I gradually grew out of this impression, and saw him as he really
was, a straightforward, honorable man, endeavoring to lighten the gloom
of a dreary duty by acts of generosity and benevolence. Save that it
was captivity, I really had nothing to complain of in my life at this
period. Mr. Holt's family was numerous, and daily some two or three
guests, generally persons in some degree placed similarly to myself,
were present at his table; and with these my time passed smoothly and
even swiftly along.

The confinement, however, and a depression, of which I was not conscious
myself, at length made their impression on my health, and one morning
Mr. Holt remarked to me that I was scarcely looking so well as usual.

"It is this place, I have no doubt," said he, "disagrees with you; but
you will be liberated in a day or two."

"How so?" asked I, in some surprise.

"Have you not heard of Gabriac's death," said he, "by suicide? He was to
have been brought up a second time for examination on Friday last, but
he was found dead in his cell, by poison, on Thursday evening."

I scarcely heard him through the details which fo