e there were no competitors for
it.

As possessors of sixty francs, M. Berthemie and I could now appease the
hunger from which we had long suffered; but we did not like this return
of fortune to be profitable to ourselves alone, and we made some
presents, which were very well received by our companions in captivity.
Though this sale of my watch brought some comfort to us, it was doomed
at a later period to plunge a family into sorrow.

The town of Rosas fell into the power of the French after a courageous
resistance. The prisoners of the garrison were sent to France, and
naturally passed through Perpignan. My father went in quest of news
wherever Spaniards were to be found. He entered a cafe at the moment
when a prisoner officer drew from his fob the watch which I had sold at
Rosas. My good father saw in this act the proof of my death, and fell
into a swoon. The officer had got the watch from a third party, and
could give no account of the fate of the person to whom it had
originally belonged.

The casemate having become necessary to the defenders of the fortress,
we were taken to a little chapel, where they deposited for twenty-four
hours those who had died in the hospital. There we were guarded by
peasants who had come across the mountain, from various villages, and
particularly from Cadaques. These peasants, eager to recount all that
they had seen of interest during their one day's campaign, questioned me
as to the deeds and behaviour of all my companions in misfortune. I
satisfied their curiosity amply, being the only one of the set who could
speak Spanish.

To enlist their good will, I also questioned them at length upon the
subject of their village, on the work that they did there, on smuggling,
their principal sources of employment, &c. &c. They answered my
questions with the loquacity common to country rustics. The next day our
guards were replaced by some others who were inhabitants of the same
village. "In my business of a roving merchant," I said to these last, "I
have been at Cadaques;" and then I began to talk to them of what I had
learnt the night before, of such an individual, who gave himself up to
smuggling with more success than others, of his beautiful residence, of
the property which he possessed near the village,--in short, of a number
of particulars which it seemed impossible for any but an inhabitant of
Cadaques to know. My jest produced an unexpected effect. Such
circumstantial details, our