"This morning M. de la Monnoye saw and spoke with Abbé Grisel a good half-hour.
"M. Moncarré had an interview with his wife in the afternoon, in accordance with your instructions.
"In obedience to your instructions of the 28th of this month, I have handed letters to Abbé Grisel and M. Ponce de Lèon.—I am, etc."
The library which Abbé Duvernet dismissed with contempt was not at the disposal of every prisoner. Both books and writing materials were in the nature of indulgences, and doled out sparingly. The rule was terribly precise on the subject of relaxations of any kind. It stated, in so many words, that: "As regards a prisoner, the governor and the officers of the château cannot be too severe and firm in preventing the least relaxation in the discipline of the Bastille; they cannot pay too much attention to this, nor punish too severely any act of insubordination." How often was that rule interpreted in favour of a sojourn in the dungeon or the "ice-chamber"?
Not only the governor and his immediate subordinates, but every turnkey, sentinel, guard of the watch, and invalid soldier on the staff was a gaoler and spy in himself. The inferior attendants of the Bastille were encouraged and sometimes directly charged to feign sympathy with a political prisoner, in order to lure him into some indiscreet avowal; but in the discharge of their ordinary duties they were enjoined to be watchful and mute. Amongst their orders were the following:
"The sentinels will arrest immediately anyone of whom they have the slightest suspicion, and will send for a staff-officer to settle the matter.
"The sentinel will not let out of his sight, on any pretext, prisoners who are exercising in the court. He will watch carefully to see whether a prisoner drops any paper, note, or packet. He will be careful to prevent prisoners from writing on the walls, and will report upon everything he may have remarked whilst on duty.
"When the corporal of the guard or any inferior officer is ordered to accompany a prisoner who may have leave to walk in the garden or on the towers, it is expressly forbidden him to hold any conversation with the prisoner. The officer is there solely to guard the prisoner, and to prevent him from signalling to anyone outside the walls."
Prisoners of a devout character must have been shocked by the studiously cynical mode of worship in the Bastille. The chapel was a dingy den on the ground floor of the prison, which Howard describes as containing