St Ives | Page 2

most offensive personages in the world, gaped at us as if we had
been baboons, sought to evangelise us to their rustic, northern religion,
as though we had been savages, or tortured us with intelligence of
disasters to the arms of France. Good, bad, and indifferent, there was
one alleviation to the annoyance of these visitors; for it was the practice
of almost all to purchase some specimen of our rude handiwork. This
led, amongst the prisoners, to a strong spirit of competition. Some were
neat of hand, and (the genius of the French being always distinguished)
could place upon sale little miracles of dexterity and taste. Some had a
more engaging appearance; fine features were found to do as well as

fine merchandise, and an air of youth in particular (as it appealed to the
sentiment of pity in our visitors) to be a source of profit. Others again
enjoyed some acquaintance with the language, and were able to
recommend the more agreeably to purchasers such trifles as they had to
sell. To the first of these advantages I could lay no claim, for my
fingers were all thumbs. Some at least of the others I possessed; and
finding much entertainment in our commerce, I did not suffer my
advantages to rust. I have never despised the social arts, in which it is a
national boast that every Frenchman should excel. For the approach of
particular sorts of visitors, I had a particular manner of address, and
even of appearance, which I could readily assume and change on the
occasion rising. I never lost an opportunity to flatter either the person
of my visitor, if it should be a lady, or, if it should be a man, the
greatness of his country in war. And in case my compliments should
miss their aim, I was always ready to cover my retreat with some
agreeable pleasantry, which would often earn me the name of an
'oddity' or a 'droll fellow.' In this way, although I was so left-handed a
toy-maker, I made out to be rather a successful merchant; and found
means to procure many little delicacies and alleviations, such as
children or prisoners desire.
I am scarcely drawing the portrait of a very melancholy man. It is not
indeed my character; and I had, in a comparison with my comrades,
many reasons for content. In the first place, I had no family: I was an
orphan and a bachelor; neither wife nor child awaited me in France. In
the second, I had never wholly forgot the emotions with which I first
found myself a prisoner; and although a military prison be not
altogether a garden of delights, it is still preferable to a gallows. In the
third, I am almost ashamed to say it, but I found a certain pleasure in
our place of residence: being an obsolete and really mediaeval fortress,
high placed and commanding extraordinary prospects, not only over
sea, mountain, and champaign but actually over the thoroughfares of a
capital city, which we could see blackened by day with the moving
crowd of the inhabitants, and at night shining with lamps. And lastly,
although I was not insensible to the restraints of prison or the scantiness
of our rations, I remembered I had sometimes eaten quite as ill in Spain,
and had to mount guard and march perhaps a dozen leagues into the
bargain. The first of my troubles, indeed, was the costume we were

obliged to wear. There is a horrible practice in England to trick out in
ridiculous uniforms, and as it were to brand in mass, not only convicts
but military prisoners, and even the children in charity schools. I think
some malignant genius had found his masterpiece of irony in the dress
which we were condemned to wear: jacket, waistcoat, and trousers of a
sulphur or mustard yellow, and a shirt or blue-and-white striped cotton.
It was conspicuous, it was cheap, it pointed us out to laughter--we, who
were old soldiers, used to arms, and some of us showing noble
scars,--like a set of lugubrious zanies at a fair. The old name of that
rock on which our prison stood was (I have heard since then) the
Painted Hill. Well, now it was all painted a bright yellow with our
costumes; and the dress of the soldiers who guarded us being of course
the essential British red rag, we made up together the elements of a
lively picture of hell. I have again and again looked round upon my
fellow-prisoners, and felt my anger rise, and choked upon tears, to
behold them thus parodied. The more part, as I have said, were peasants,
somewhat bettered perhaps by the drill- sergeant, but for all that
ungainly, loutish fellows, with no more than a mere barrack-room