z in his 'Memoires du Marquis de Montbrun' and his
'Memoires d'Artagnan', for one can easily imagine that the naked,
headless body might escape recognition. M. Eugene Sue, in his 'Histoire
de la Marine' (vol. ii, chap. 6), had adopted this view, which coincides
with the accounts left by Philibert de Jarry and the Marquis de
Ville, the MSS. of whose letters and 'Memoires' are to be found in the
Bibliotheque du Roi.

"In the first volume of the 'Histoire de la Detention des Philosophes
et des Gens de Lettres a la Bastille, etc.', we find the following
passage:--

"Without dwelling on the difficulty and danger of an abduction, which
an Ottoman scimitar might any day during this memorable siege render
unnecessary, we shall restrict ourselves to declaring positively that
the correspondence of Saint-Mars from 1669 to 1680 gives us no ground
for supposing that the governor of Pignerol had any great prisoner
of state in his charge during that period of time, except Fouquet and
Lauzun.'"

While we profess no blind faith in the conclusions arrived at by the
learned critic, we would yet add to the considerations on which he
relies another, viz. that it is most improbable that Louis XIV should
ever have considered it necessary to take such rigorous measures against
the Duc de Beaufort. Truculent and self-confident as he was, he never
acted against the royal authority in such a manner as to oblige the king
to strike him down in secret; and it is difficult to believe that
Louis XIV, peaceably seated on his throne, with all the enemies of his
minority under his feet, should have revenged himself on the duke as an
old Frondeur.

The critic calls our attention to another fact also adverse to the
theory under consideration. The Man in the Iron Mask loved fine linen
and rich lace, he was reserved in character and possessed of extreme
refinement, and none of this suits the portraits of the 'roi des halles'
which contemporary historians have drawn.

Regarding the anagram of the name Marchiali (the name under which the
death of the prisoner was registered), 'hic amiral', as a proof,
we cannot think that the gaolers of Pignerol amused themselves
in propounding conundrums to exercise the keen intellect of their
contemporaries; and moreover the same anagram would apply equally well
to the Count of Vermandois, who was made admiral when only twenty-two
months old. Abbe Papon, in his roamings through Provence, paid a visit
to the prison in