Here we underwent the
ceremony of having our pocket-books searched for papers and letters, and
our trunks rummaged for knives and fire-arms. This done, we were shown
to the lodging I have described, and the poor priests, already
insufferably crouded, were obliged almost to join their beds in order to
make room for us.--I will not pain you by a recital of all the
embarrassments and distresses we had to surmount before we could even
rest ourselves. We were in want of every thing, and the rules of the
prison such, that it was nearly impossible, for some time, to procure any
thing: but the human mind is more flexible than we are often disposed to
imagine it; and in two days we were able to see our situation in this
best point of view, (that is, as an escape from Arras,) and the affair of
submitting our bodies to our minds must be atchieved by time.--We have
now been here a week. We have sounded the very depth of humiliation,
taken our daily allowance of bread with the rest of the prisoners, and
contracted a most friendly intimacy with the gaoler.
I have discovered since our arrival, that the order for transferring us
hither described me as a native of the Low Countries. I know not how
this happened, but my friend has insisted on my not rectifying the
mistake, for as the French talk continually of re-conquering Brabant, she
persuades herself such an event would procure me my liberty.
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