ind
that when he requested me to say what I should prefer, I mentioned only
some religious and instructive works. I pretended to devote myself
assiduously to study, and I thus gave him convincing proof of the moral
reformation he was so anxious to bring about. It was nothing, however,
but rank hypocrisy--I blush to confess it. Instead of studying, when
alone I did nothing but curse my destiny. I lavished the bitterest
execrations on my prison, and the tyrants who detained me there. If I
ceased for a moment from these lamentations, it was only to relapse
into the tormenting remembrance of my fatal and unhappy love. Manon's
absence--the mystery in which her fate was veiled--the dread of never
again beholding her; these formed the subject of my melancholy
thoughts. I fancied her in the arms of G---- M----. Far from
imagining that he could have been brute enough to subject her to the
same treatment to which I was condemned, I felt persuaded that he had
only procured my removal, in order that he might possess her in
undisturbed enjoyment.

"Oh! how miserable were the days and nights I thus passed! They seemed
to be of endless duration. My only hope of escape now, was in
hypocrisy; I scrutinised the countenance, and carefully marked every
observation that fell from the governor, in order to ascertain what he
really thought of me; and looking on him as the sole arbiter of my
future fate, I made it my study to win, if possible, his favour. I
soon had the satisfaction to find that I was firmly established in his
good graces, and no longer doubted his disposition to befriend me.

"I, one day, ventured to ask him whether my liberation depended on him.
He replied that it was not altogether in his hands, but that he had no
doubt that on his representation M. G---- M----, at whose instance the
lieutenant-general of police had ordered me to be confined, would
consent to my being set at liberty. 'May I flatter myself,' rejoined
I, in the mildest tone, 'that he will consider two months, which I have
now spent in this prison, as a sufficient atonement?' He offered to
speak to him, if I wished it. I implored him without delay to do me
that favour.

"He told me two days afterwards that G---- M---- was so sensibly
affected by what he had heard, that he not only was ready to consent to
my liberation, but that he had even expressed a strong desire to become
better acquainted with me, and that he himself purposed to pay me a