was
lined with shops and the houses of the _personnel_ of the prison: then
came a second gate, with entrances for carriages and for foot
passengers, each with its drawbridge. Beyond these a second quadrangle
was entered, to the right of which stood the Governor's house and an
armoury. Another double portal to the left gave entrance across the
old fosse once fed by the waters of the Seine, to the prison fortress
itself, with its eight tall blackened towers, each divided into five
floors, and its crenelated ramparts.

[Footnote 164: A whole library has been written concerning the
identity of this famous prisoner. There is little doubt that the mask
was of velvet and not of iron, and that the mysterious captive who
died on 19th November 1703 in the Bastille, was Count Mattioli of
Bologna, who was secretly arrested for having betrayed the confidence
of Louis XIV.]

The Bastille, which in the time of the English rule, had seen as its
captains the Duke of Exeter, Falstaff, and invincible Talbot, was
first used in Richelieu's time as a permanent state prison, and filled
under Louis XIV. with Jansenists and Protestants, who were thus
separated from the prisoners of the common jails; and, later, under
Louis XV. by a whole population of obnoxious pamphleteers and
champions of philosophy. Books as well as their authors were
incarcerated, and released when considered no longer dangerous; the
tomes of famous _Encyclopedie_ spent some years there. From the middle
of the eighteenth century the horrible, dark and damp dungeons, half
underground and sometimes flooded, formerly inhabited by the lowest
type of criminals, were reserved as temporary cells for insubordinate
prisoners, and since the accession of Louis XIV. they were no more
used. The Bastille during the reigns of the three later Louis was the
most comfortable prison in Paris, and detention there rather than in
the other prisons was often sought for and granted as a favour; the
prisoners might furnish their rooms, and have their own libraries and
food. In the middle of the seventeenth century, certain rooms were
furnished at the king's expense for those who were without means. The
rooms were warmed, the prisoners well fed, and sums varying from three
to thirty-five francs per day, according to condition,[165] were
allotted for their maintenance. A considerable amount of personal
liberty was allowed to many and indemnities were in later years paid
to those who had been unju