garden, where I have painfully breathed a purer air, at the risk of sinking beneath the fervid rays of an unmitigated sun, are not scenes to excite regret; but when I think that I am still subject to the tyranny which has so long condemned me to them, this reflection, with a sentiment perhaps of national pride, which is wounded by accepting as a favour what I have been unjustly deprived of, renders me composed, if not indifferent, at the prospect of my release.

This dreary epoch of my life has not been without its alleviations.   I
have found a chearful companion in Mad. de M____, who, at sixty, was
brought here, because she happened to be the daughter of Count L____, who
has been dead these thirty years!—­The graces and silver accents of
Madame de B____, might have assisted in beguiling severer captivity; and
the Countess de C____, and her charming daughters (the eldest of whom is
not to be described in the common place of panegyric), who, though they
have borne their own afflictions with dignity, have been sensible to the
misfortunes of others, and whom I must, in justice, except from all the
imputations of meanness or levity, which I have sometimes had occasion to
notice in those who, like themselves, were objects of republican
persecution, have essentially contributed to diminish the horrors of
confinement.—­I reckon it likewise among my satisfactions, that, with the
exception of the Marechalle de Biron,* and General O’Moran, none of our
fellow-prisoners have suffered on the scaffold.—­

* The Marechalle de Biron, a very old and infirm woman, was taken from hence to the Luxembourg at Paris, where her daughter-in-law, the Duchess, was also confined.  A cart arriving at that prison to convey a number of victims to the tribunal, the list, in the coarse dialect of republicanism, contained the name of la femme Biron.  “But there are two of them,” said the keeper.  “Then bring them both.”—­ The aged Marechalle, who was at supper, finished her meal while the rest were preparing, then took up her book of devotion, and departed chearfully.—­The next day both mother and daughter were guillotined.

—­Dumont has, indeed, virtually occasioned the death of several; in particular the Duc du Chatelet, the Comte de Bethune, Mons. de Mancheville, &c.—­and it is no merit in him that Mr. Luttrell, with a poor nun of the name of Pitt,* whom he took from hence to Paris, as a capture which might give him importance, were not massacred either by the mob or the tribunal.

* This poor woman, whose intellects, as I am informed, appeared in a state of derangement, was taken from a convent at Abbeville, and brought to the Providence, as a relation of Mr. Pitt, though I believe she has no pretensions to that honour.  But the name of Pitt gave her importance; she was sent to Paris under a military escort, and Dumont announced the arrival of this miserable victim with all the airs of a conqueror.  I have