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should adopt. I saw that, being incapable of the mean action of
obtaining impunity by procuring the destruction of others, the only
prospect that lay before me was the scaffold, or long protracted
captivity. It was necessary that I should prepare myself. I will
live, I said to myself, so long as I shall be permitted, and when
they take my life, I will do as the unfortunate have done before me;
when arrived at the last moment, I can die. I endeavoured, as much
as possible, not to complain, and to obtain every possible enjoyment
of mind within my reach. The most customary was that of recalling
the many advantages which had thrown a charm round my previous life;
the best of fathers, of mothers, excellent brothers and sisters,
many friends, a good education, and a taste for letters. Should I
now refuse to be grateful to God for all these benefits, because He
had pleased to visit me with misfortune? Sometimes, indeed, in
recalling past scenes to mind, I was affected even to tears; but I
soon recovered my courage and cheerfulness of heart.

At the commencement of my captivity I was fortunate enough to meet
with a friend. It was neither the governor, nor any of his under-
jailers, nor any of the lords of the process-chamber. Who then?--a
poor deaf and dumb boy, five or six years old, the offspring of
thieves, who had paid the penalty of the law. This wretched little
orphan was supported by the police, with several other boys in the
same condition of life. They all dwelt in a room opposite my own,
and were only permitted to go out at certain hours to breathe a
little air in the yard. Little deaf and dumb used to come under my
window, smiled, and made his obeisance to me. I threw him a piece
of bread; he took it, and gave a leap of joy, then ran to his
companions, divided it, and returned to eat his own share under the
window. The others gave me a wistful look from a distance, but
ventured no nearer, while the deaf and dumb boy expressed a sympathy
for me; not, I found, affected, out of mere selfishness. Sometimes
he was at a loss what to do with the bread I gave him, and made
signs that he had eaten enough, as also his companions. When he saw
one of the under-jailers going into my room, he would give him what
he had got from me, in order to restore it to me. Yet he continued
to haunt my window, and seemed rejoiced whenever I deigned to notice
him. One day the jailer permitted him to enter my prison, when he
instantly ran to embrace my knees, actually uttering a cry of joy.
I took him up in my arms, and he threw his little hands about my
neck, and lavished on me the tenderest caresses. How much affection
in his smile and manner! how eagerly I longed to have him to
educate, raise him from his abject condition, and snatch him,
perhaps, from utter ruin. I never even learnt his name; he did not
himself know that he had one.

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