The melancholy intelligence of my poor fellow-sufferer Essel’s violent death was an additional pang to my misfortunes and anguish. I was anxiously asking the particulars, when the guard came up, and angrily drove my friends to their respective dungeons for daring to communicate with me. I, with the Corsicans, was most unceremoniously conducted to a different part of the fortress, called La Grosse Tête.
I shall not attempt to describe the fortress of Bitche. To give a minute detail of its strength, souterrains, etc., would fill a volume. At this moment it is sufficient for me to say that it is reckoned one of the strongest fortifications of France, and is built on the summit of an immensely high rock, out of which all its subterranean caves are hollowed. It has, on one side, three ramparts. The first is from 90 to 100 feet high; the second, from 40 to 50; and the third, from 25 to 30, with redoubts, entrenchments, and all contrivances of military engineering, almost innumerable.[24] As I surveyed these stupendous heights and depths, it appeared to me a physical impossibility to escape from it, and I was filled with despair. Nothing but madness could entertain a thought of attempting to escape. Being now arrived at the wretched dungeon I was to inhabit, my handcuffs and chains were taken off, and the Corsican deserters were conducted to the condemned cells. They were, I believe, soon afterwards shot. A dismal dungeon was unlocked, in which it seemed that I was doomed to be entombed alive. Solitude appeared to me dreadful, and I looked upon a “living death” as my final lot; but I found in the dungeon Mr. Worth, midshipman, and a Captain Brine of the merchant service. The latter was one of those who came from Verdun with me. They were on a door, which they had managed to unhinge, and which lay as a platform to keep them out of the excrement and wet, that were more than ankle deep: they had a little straw and a blanket. They informed me, they had been companions of the unfortunate Essel in the late attempt to get over the ramparts. Six of them had broken out of their cave, had got a rope made of sheets, and were on the point of lowering themselves down, when they were discovered and the alarm given, which made four of them clap on the rope together, though only strong enough to lower one at a time, or two at most; the rope, in consequence, broke. One was dashed to pieces, and the three others—I think their names were Nason, Potts, and Adams—so severely mangled and bruised that little hopes were at first entertained of their recovery; Worth and Brine were soon seized by the guards on the embrasure. The others were then improving fast, and they expected them in the dungeon in a few days, as soon as the surgeon had reported them well enough; after which they would have to remain in this receptacle of filth for thirty-one days, which was the usual time of being buried alive in the first and most horrible gradation of our captivity. It was fifty deep stone steps under ground, for I have often counted them, and the most dark and intricate passages led from it to the gaoler’s house, who had the watching and superintending of the prisoners, in conjunction with a guard.
I had not been more than half-an-hour in this dismal and filthy abode, when a gendarme came, and desired le nouveau arrivé to follow him. I imagined it was to liberate me (that is to say, from this dungeon), and to place me with my companions, Messrs. Ashworth and Tuthill, in one of the caves, which was deemed a kind of indulgence, they having a bed and fire allowed in the latter; but I was greatly in error.
I followed my guide through all the before-mentioned passages, and at last arrived at the gaoler’s house; where I was accosted, in the following words, by a man who wore a leathern cap and frock-coat:—
“You, sir, are the person who has given us so much trouble, and been the cause of the gendarmes having been transported to the galleys.”
“Not to my knowledge.”
“You are, sir, and merit the greatest severity that can be inflicted.”
This induced me to request to be informed what he meant.
“I mean, sir,” revociferated he, “that you deserve the severest punishment, for not resting quietly with your guards, and for being accessory to the punishment of them.”
I replied, “I was conscious that I had only done my duty in endeavouring to escape from slavery, tyranny, and oppression, and every other cruelty that could be invented.”