The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck, vol 2 | Page 6

twelve feet high, the key of the door of which was entrusted to the officer of the guard, it being the King's intention to prevent all possibility of speech or communication with the sentinels. The only motion I had the power to make was that of jumping upward, or swinging my arms to procure myself warmth. When more accustomed to these fetters, I became capable of moving from side to side, about four feet; but this pained my shin-bones.
The cell had been finished with lime and plaster but eleven days, and everybody supposed it would be impossible I should exist in these damps above a fortnight. I remained six months, continually immersed in very cold water, that trickled upon me from the thick arches under which I was; and I can safely affirm that, for the first three months, I was never dry; yet did I continue in health. I was visited daily, at noon, after relieving guard, and the doors were then obliged to be left open for some minutes, otherwise the dampness of the air put out their candles.
This was my situation, and here I sat, destitute of friends, helplessly wretched, preyed on by all the torture of thought that continually suggested the most gloomy, the most horrid, the most dreadful of images. My heart was not yet wholly turned to stone; my fortitude was sunken to despondency; my dungeon was the very cave of despair; yet was my arm restrained, and this excess of misery endured.
How then may hope be wholly eradicated from the heart of man? My fortitude, after some time, began to revive; I glowed with the desire of convincing the world I was capable of suffering what man had never suffered before; perhaps of at last emerging from this load of wretchedness triumphant over my enemies. So long and ardently did my fancy dwell on this picture, that my mind at length acquired a heroism which Socrates himself certainly never possessed. Age had benumbed his sense of pleasure, and he drank the poisonous draught with cool indifference; but I was young, inured to high hopes, yet now beholding deliverance impossible, or at an immense, a dreadful distance. Such, too, were the other sufferings of soul and body, I could not hope they might be supported and live.
About noon my den was opened. Sorrow and compassion were painted on the countenances of my keepers. No one spoke; no one bade me good morrow. Dreadful indeed was their arrival; for, unaccustomed to the monstrous bolts and bars, they were kept resounding for a full half- hour before such soul-chilling, such hope-murdering impediments were removed. It was the voice of tyranny that thundered.
My night-table was taken out, a camp-bed, mattress, and blankets were brought me; a jug of water set down, and beside it an ammunition loaf of six pounds' weight. "That you may no more complain of hunger," said the town-major, "you shall have as much bread as you can eat." The door was shut, and I again left to my thoughts.
What a strange thing is that called happiness! How shall I express my extreme joy when, after eleven months of intolerable hunger, I was again indulged with a full feast of coarse ammunition bread? The fond lover never rushed more eagerly to the arias of his expecting bride, the famished tiger more ravenously on his prey, than I upon this loaf. I ate, rested; surveyed the precious morsel; ate again; and absolutely shed tears of pleasure. Breaking bit after bit, I had by evening devoured all my loaf.
Oh, Nature! what delight hast thou combined with the gratification of thy wants! Remember this, ye who gorge, ye who rack invention to excite appetite, and yet which you cannot procure! Remember how simple are the means that will give a crust of mouldy bread a flavour more exquisite than all the spices of the East, or all the profusion of land or sea! Remember this, grow hungry, and indulge your sensuality.
Alas! my enjoyment was of short duration. I soon found that excess is followed by pain and repentance. My fasting had weakened digestion, and rendered it inactive. My body swelled, my water-jug was emptied; cramps, colics, and at length inordinate thirst racked me all the night. I began to pour curses on those who seemed to refine on torture, and, after starving me so long, to invite me to gluttony. Could I not have reclined on my bed, I should indeed have been driven, this night, to desperation; yet even this was but a partial relief; for, not yet accustomed to my enormous fetters, I could not extend myself in the same manner I was afterwards taught to do by habit. I dragged them, however, so together as to enable me to sit down on the bare