The rest were mere diggers of the soil, treaders of grapes or hewers of wood, who had been suddenly and violently preferred to the glorious state of soldiers.

We had but the one interest in common: each of us who had any skill with his fingers passed the hours of his captivity in the making of little toys and _articles of Paris_; and the prison was daily visited at certain hours by a concourse of people of the country, come to exult over our distress, or--it is more tolerant to suppose--their own vicarious triumph.

Some moved among us with a decency of shame or sympathy.

Others were the 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.