proposal; and at the
same time resisted the return of their own countryman.

The gallant Bergeret was resolved to preserve his word of honour
unsullied, or to perish in the attempt. Finding all his efforts to
obtain the liberation of the illustrious captive unavailing, menaced
with death if he departed, and invited by promised command and promotion
if he remained, he contrived to quit his own country by stealth, and
returned a voluntary exile to his generous and confiding conquerors.

From captain B----'s hotel I went to the Temple, so celebrated in the
gloomy history of the revolution. It stands in the Rue du Temple, in the
Fauxbourg of that name. The entrance is handsome, and does not much
impress the idea of the approach to a place of such confinement. Over
the gates is a pole, supporting a dirty and tattered bonnet rouge, of
which species of republican decoration there are very few now to be seen
in Paris. The door was opened to me by the principal gaoler, whose
predecessor had been dismissed on account of his imputed connivance in
the escape of sir Sidney Smith. His appearance seemed fully to qualify
him for his savage office, and to insure his superiors against all
future apprehension, of a remission of duty by any act of humanity,
feeling, or commiseration. He told me, that he could not permit me to
advance beyond the lodge, on account of a peremptory order which he had
just received from government. From this place I had a full command of
the walk and prison, the latter of which is situated in the centre of
the walls. He pointed out to me the window of the room in which the
royal sufferers languished. As the story of sir Sidney Smith's escape
from this prison has been involved in some ambiguity, a short recital of
it will, perhaps, not prove uninteresting.

After several months had rolled away, since the gates of his prison had
first closed upon the british hero, he observed that a lady who lived in
an upper apartment on the opposite side of the street, seemed frequently
to look towards that part of the prison in which he was confined. As
often as he observed her, he played some tender air upon his flute, by
which, and by imitating every motion which she made, he at length
succeeded in fixing her attention upon him, and had the happiness of
remarking that she occasionally observed him with a glass. One morning
when he saw that she was looking attentively upon him in this manner, he
tore a blank leaf from an ol