the courtyard of the
prison while he showed himself, for a few moments, and put his hands
through the bars of the window. However, the rigor of these orders was
relaxed for the colonel's young child three or four years of age, and his
father obtained the favor of embracing him. He came each morning in his
mother's arms, and a turnkey carried him in to the prisoner, before which
inconvenient witness the poor little thing played his role with all the
skill of a consummate actor. He would pretend to be lame, and complain
of having sand in his shoes which hurt him and the colonel, turning his
back on the jailer, and taking the child in his lap to remove the cause
of the trouble, would find in his son's shoe a note from his wife,
informing him in a few words of the state of the trial, and what he had
to hope or fear for himself. At length, after many months of captivity,
sentence having been pronounced against the conspirators, Colonel
Delelee, against whom no charge had been made, was not absolved as he had
a right to expect, but was struck off the army list, arbitrarily put
under surveillance, and prohibited from coming within forty leagues of
Paris. He was also forbidden to return to Besancon, and it was more than
a year after leaving prison before he was permitted to do so.

Young and full of courage, the Colonel saw, from the depths of his
retirement, his friends and comrades make their way, and gain upon the
battlefield fame, rank, and glory, while he himself was condemned to
inaction and obscurity, and to pass his days in following on the map the
triumphant march of those armies in which he felt himself worthy to
resume his rank. Innumerable applications were addressed by him and his
friends to the head of the Empire, that he might be allowed to go even as
a common volunteer, and rejoin his former comrades with his knapsack on
his shoulder; but these petitions were refused, the will of the Emperor
was inflexible, and to each new application he only replied, "Let him
wait." The inhabitants of Besancon, who considered Colonel Delelee as
their fellow-citizen, interested themselves warmly in the unmerited
misfortunes of this brave officer; and when an occasion presented itself
of recommending him anew to the clemency, or rather to the justice, of
the Emperor, they availed themselves of it.

It was, I believe, on the return from Prussia and Poland that from all
parts of France there came deputations charged with congratula