Few persons were admitted to the Garden Prison during the presence of the English squadron; but it did not prevent captain Bergeret and M. Bonnefoy from coming occasionally. In the end of October I learned with much regret, that the interpreter had been dismissed from his employment, in consequence of having carried only one copy of the same newspaper to general De Caen, when two had been found in an American vessel which he had boarded off the port, according to custom; the other had been communicated to some of his friends, which was deemed an irremissible offence. This obliging man, to whom I was under obligations for many acts of attention and some of real service, feared to ask any future permission to visit the Garden Prison.
Admiral Linois arrived from a cruise on the 31st, with three rich prizes, and got into Port Bourbon unimpeded by our ships, which were off another part of the island; and the same evening commodore Osborn quitted Mauritius. Mr. Robertson and Mr. Webb of the Aplin were now permitted to go to England by the way of America [NOVEMBER 1804]; and I took the good opportunity of sending by the first of these gentlemen a copy of the general chart of Terra Australis, comprehending the whole of my discoveries and examinations in abridgment, and a paper on the magnetism of ships addressed to the president of the Royal Society.* Four officers of the army also obtained permission to go to India, on condition of returning, should four French officers whose names were specified, be not sent back in exchange; and two other gentlemen left the Garden Prison, and the island soon afterward. In lieu of these, were sent in captain Turner and lieutenant Cartwright of the Indian army, and the officers of the Princess Charlotte indiaman.
[* This paper was read before the Society, and published in the Transactions of 1805, Part II.]
By information received from the Grande-Riviere prison, where the merchant officers and the seamen were confined, it appeared that my six remaining people, and no doubt many others, were very miserable and almost naked; having been hurried off suddenly from Flacq, and compelled to leave their few clothes behind. On this occasion I addressed the captain-general on the score of humanity, intreating him either to order their clothes to be restored, or that they should be furnished with others; and on the same day an answer was returned in the most polite manner by colonel D'Arsonval, saying that an order had been given for all the prisoners to be fresh clothed, and their wants supplied. Six weeks afterward, however, finding that the poor seamen remained in the same naked state as before, I wrote to remind the town major of what he had said; requesting at the same time, if it were not intended to give these unfortunate men any clothing, that Mr. Aken might be permitted to visit them, in order to relieve their urgent necessities from my own purse. No answer was returned to this letter, but it produced the desired effect.
DECEMBER 1804
My hopes of a speedy liberation by an order of the first consul became weakened in December, on seeing nothing arrive to confirm them after a whole year's imprisonment. On the 17th I wrote to remind the captain-general that one year had elapsed; and requested him to consider that the chance of war rendered the arrival of despatches uncertain--that I was suffering an irretrievable loss of time, and very severely in my health, advancement, and every thing that man holds dear; I begged him to reflect, that the rights of the most severe justice would be ensured by sending me to France, where the decision of my fate was remitted; and where, should the judgment of the French government be favourable, it could be immediately followed by a return to my country and family, and the resumption of my peaceable labours. No answer being given at the end of a week, a second letter was sent, inclosing a copy of the extract from captain Baudin; and His Excellency was requested to compare the treatment of the French commander at Port Jackson with what I had received at Mauritius, and at least to give Mr. Aken and myself the liberty of some district in the island where we might take exercise, and find the amusement necessary to the re-establishment of our health; but neither of these letters obtained any reply, or the least notice.
Mr. Aken had been removed to the hospital in September, and after a stay of six weeks had returned, more from finding himself so ill accommodated and fed than from the improvement in his health. He now declined rapidly; [JANUARY 1805] and my own health was impaired by a constitutional gravelly complaint to which confinement had given accelerated force, and by a bilious disorder arising partly from the same cause, from the return of hot weather, and discouraging reflections on our prospects. We were therefore visited by Dr. Laborde, principal physician of the medical staff, who judged the air and exercises of the country to be the most certain means of restoration; and in order to our procuring them, he gave a certificate which I sent to general De Caen through colonel Monistrol, then become town major. No answer was returned; but after some days it was told me that Dr. Laborde had received a message from the general, desiring him not to interfere with matters which did not concern him; and this was the sole mark of attention paid to his certificate or to our situation.*
[* The doctor had said in his certificate, "J'estime qu'il faut prévenir 'augmentation de ses maux; et en le secourant apropos, c'est assurer la conservation d'un homme dont les travaux doivent servir aux progrès des sciences, et a 1'utilité de ses semblables.">[
Being thus disappointed in every attempt to procure an amelioration for my companion and myself, I sought the means of dispensing with the captain-general's humanity. I rose very early, and took much exercise in our inclosure before the heat of the sun, became too powerful; and applied closely to the charts and accounts of my voyage, which ill health and a languid melancholy had for some time caused to be neglected. By perseverance in these means, my disorders were at least prevented from becoming worse; but more particularly I acquired a tranquil state of mind, and had even the happiness of forgetting general De Caen, sometimes for days together. The strength of my companion was too much exhausted for such a regimen; and he was obliged to return to the hospital, being so much reduced that there was reason to fear for his life.
Several military and merchant officers obtained permissions at this time to depart on parole, some to India, others to America; which furnished opportunities of writing many letters. I addressed one to admiral Rainier, the commander in chief of His Majesty's ships in India, upon the subject of my detention; and another to lord William Bentinck, governor of Madras, in favour of two relations of my friend Pitot, who were prisoners under his government; and it is with much gratitude to His Lordship that I add his more than compliance with the request: he not only set the two prisoners at liberty, but used his endeavours to procure my release from general De Caen.