until then that he clearly understood the
pitiless thickness of the walls, the impenetrable nature of the cement,
invincible to all other influence but that of time, and possessed of no
other weapon but despair. He leaned his forehead against the door, and
let the feverish throbbings of his heart calm by degrees; it had seemed
as if one single additional pulsation would have made it burst.

"A moment will come when the food which is given to the prisoners will
be brought to me. I shall then see some one, I shall speak to him, and
get an answer."

And the king tried to remember at what hour the first repast of the
prisoners was served at the Bastille; he was ignorant even of this
detail. The feeling of remorse at this remembrance smote him like the
keen thrust of a dagger, that he should have lived for five-and-twenty
years a king, and in the enjoyment of every happiness, without having
bestowed a moment's thought on the misery of those who had been unjustly
deprived of their liberty. The king blushed from very shame. He felt
that Heaven, in permitting this fearful humiliation, did no more than
render to the man the same torture as was inflicted by that man upon so
many others. Nothing could be more efficacious for re-awakening his
mind to religious influences, than the prostration of his heart, and
mind, and soul beneath the feeling of such acute wretchedness. But Louis
dared not even kneel in prayer to God to entreat him to terminate his
bitter trial.

"Heaven is right," he said; "Heaven acts wisely. It would be cowardly to
pray to Heaven for that which I have so often refused to my own
fellow-creatures."

He had reached this stage of his reflections, that is, of his agony of
mind, when a similar noise was again heard behind his door, followed
this time by the sound of the key in the lock, and of the bolts being
withdrawn from their staples. The king bounded forward to be nearer to
the person who was about to enter, but, suddenly reflecting that it was
a movement unworthy of a sovereign, he paused, assumed a noble and calm
expression, which for him was easy enough, and waited with his back
turned toward the window, in order, to some extent, to conceal his
agitation from the eyes of the person who was about entering. It was
only a jailer with a basket of provisions. The king looked at the man
with restless anxiety, and waited until he spoke.

"Ah!" said the latter, "you have broken your chair. I said you had done