s
called the _maison de force_; the unfortunates confined here were
subjected to the most rigorous regulations, their labor was made "as
severe as possible," but was ameliorated if they showed signs of
repentance; their food was restricted to bread, soup, and water, they
were clothed in linsey-woolsey gowns and wore sabots, and they slept
upon straw, with a thin coverlet. For lighter faults they were punished
by withdrawal of the soup, imprisonment in the cachot, and the wearing
of the carcan, or wooden collar; for graver offences they were locked
up, for longer or shorter periods, in a dark and filthy dungeon which
was called the _Malaise_, and which was much like the _in pace_ of the
Middle Ages. A regulation of this same year, 1684, applied the same
system to the convicted prisoners and to the women imprisoned at the
instance of their relatives or their husbands. The maison de force,
placed in the centre of the Salpetriere, became the prison de la Force.
It included the _commun_, for the most dissolute and degraded women; the
_correction_, in which were placed those who gave some hopes of reform;
the prison, reserved for those detained by the king's orders, and the
_grande Force_, for those condemned by the courts. The women and young
girls destined to be sent to the colonies were kept in the Salpetriere
while waiting for their embarkation.

[Illustration: ANNUAL PROCESSION OF JUDGES, MAGISTRATES, ETC., ON THE
OCCASION OF THE GRAND MASS, HELD AT THE BEGINNING OF THE JUDICIARY
SEASON, IN THE SAINTE-CHAPELLE.

After a drawing by E. Loevy.]

In 1780 were erected the infirmaries of the prison; these were destined
for the reception of young girls enceinte, furious insane female
patients, and the incurables of all kinds. Previous to this, all the
inmates who became ill were sent to the Hotel-Dieu. Eight years later,
Tenon wrote that he had seen eighty thousand persons in the Salpetriere;
and La Rochefoucauld's description of the condition of this
prison-hospital and its inmates is almost equally incredible: "The most
horrible enclosure that could be presented to the eyes of those who have
preserved some respect for humanity is that in which nearly two hundred
women, young and old, attacked by the itch, scald-head, and scrofula,
sleep four or five in a bed promiscuously, communicating to each other
all those diseases which contagion can propagate. How many times, in
traversing all these haunts of misery, does not one say