The descriptions of the Bastille have been gathered by me from the accounts of the spy, Constantin de Renneville, who was a prisoner for eleven years, and who, when released, went to London, and was there assassinated by an unknown hand; of the adventurer, Jean Louis Carra, who, after writing odes of praise upon the fall of the Bastille, perished at the hands of the republicans; of the Duc de Richelieu, who, when a very old man of ninety, could not resist visiting the place where he had been three times confined when a very young one; and of Voltaire, who had had considerable experience of its hospitality, having been sent there twice; and of many other authors of the past and present.
[NOTE E]. Arrest of Charles Edward.
The arrest of Charles Edward took place under precisely similar circumstances to those which I have described, with one exception, namely, that it was carried out on his quitting the opera house in the Palais Royal instead of outside his own house on the Quai des Théatins, and it was from behind the kitchen of the Palais Royal that he was taken away in a hired cab. I have transposed the arrest to the latter spot to suit the requirements of the story. The Duc de Biron took part in it, against his will, in the capacity of colonel-in-chief of the guards. He was the least celebrated of the many Ducs de Biron, of whom a French writer said "all were celebrated and some notorious."
FOOTNOTES
[Footnote 1]: "Tandem triumphans" was the motto emblazoned on Charles Edward's banner during the march into England. "Nunquam triumphans" was afterwards a password between Jacobites.
[Footnote 2]: The remarkable name of one of the royal yachts of George II.
[Footnote 3]: Inaugurated 1724.
[Footnote 4]: At this period most of the houses in Kensington-square had large gardens at the back. Those on the west side, where I Fordingbridge's is supposed to be situated, covered what known as Scarsdale-place.
[Footnote 5]: A tipstaff, or executor of warrants for the Government.
[Footnote 6]: Governor of the Bastille from 1718 to 1749, and father of the last governor of that prison, Le Marquis Bernard Réné Jourdan de Launey, who was brutally murdered by the populace on the fall of the Bastille in 1789.