great many dishes and sauces. He was
discovered in the kitchen one day by Sparkes,
weeping bitterly into a stew-pan, by the side
of an empty port wine bottle. He declared
on that occasion, with some thickness of utterance,
that the Directory were brigands, and
the National Assembly thieves, and that the
name of the legitimate ruler of France was
Louis the Eighteenth. He was very pale and
shaky next day, affected great republican
sternness, and insisted more than ever upon
being called "citizen," and "Junius Brutus,"
when, honest man, his name was Jean
Baptiste all over, from his slippers to his white
nightcap. These details may probably seem
useless; but the commodore's port wine had
more to do with his escape from his chambers
in the Temple than you may at present imagine.

One gilt and burnished afternoon in the
autumn of this same year 'ninety-eight, a
party of four persons were assembled in Sir
Sidney Smith's sitting-room in the Tower of
the Temple. One of these persons was
Captain Wright, whom, as he has nothing further
to do with this history, I need not specially
describe. The second was Sir Sidney Smith,
then in all the pride and vigour of his
manhood—a little pale, perhaps, through want of
exercise, but a comely man, and fair to look
upon. He had his hair powdered, and wore
top-boots, which would seem somewhat
strange articles of costume for a naval officer,
albeit in plain clothes, in these days, but were
the fashion in 'ninety-eight. The third was
Mr. Sparkes, his body servant. Mr. Sparkes
was of the middle height, and remarkably
stout, though anything but corpulent in the
face. He was so stout about the chest, that
you could scarcely divest yourself of the
impression that he had more than one waistcoat
on. Perhaps he had. A very low forehead
had Mr. Sparkes, and a very voluminous
allowance of bushy red hair. He was
freckled, and his chin was lost in the folds
of his ample cravat. He had a considerable
impediment in his speech, which caused
him to speak slowly, and not often, and not
much at a time; but he was a great humorist,
and was an enormous favourite among the
prison officials for his droll sayings, and for
the hideously execrable manner in which he
pronounced the French language. A thorough
Briton—an incorrigible "rosbif" was Sparkes
said they—there were some hopes of the
commodore acquiring a decent knowledge of
French after a few years' residence, but as for
Sparkes, he would never learn, not he.
Doctor Jollivet, the prison surgeon, who had
been in England, and spoke ravishing English,
declared John as " tout ce qu'il y avait de
plus Coqueni"—by which, it is to be
presumed, he meant Cockney. Sparkes had
been brought up, he said, with the
commodore, which accounted for a certain degree
of familiarity with which he treated him, and
which he was far from showing to the other
servants. This present golden afternoon John
half stood behind his master's chair, half
leaned against the side-board. He was
attentive in supplying the wants of the other
persons present, but he did not neglect to
help himself liberally from a special bottle of
port behind him, nor did he refrain from
joining, from time to time, in the
conversation.

The fourth person of this group, and who
sat at the end of the table facing the Commodore,
was a Frenchman,—a very important
person, too, you are to know, being Citizen
Mutius Scævola Lasne (formerly Martin),
concierge, keeper or head gaoler of the Temple.
He was responsible for the safe-keeping of
the prisoners with his head. He slept every
night with the prison keys under his pillow.
He knew where the secret dungeons—the
underground cachots and cabanons—were,
and what manner of men were in them. He
was not a man to be despised.

Citizen Lasne was a very large, fat man,
with a small head. Gaolers generally are,—
but let that pass. Now there is no medium
of character or disposition in large fat men
with small heads. They are either intolerably
vicious, slowly cruel, stolidly hard-hearted,
mischievously stupid, torpidly revengeful, dully
selfish, sensual and avaricious, or else they
are lazy, good-natured, genial, soft-hearted
giants, — mere toasts and butter, giving freely,
lending freely, spending freely, always ready
to weep at a pitiful tale, to sing the best song
they know, to lend you their best umbrella,
and to walk wheresoever you wish to lead
them. It is the same with bald-headed men
who wear spectacles. They are either
atrocious villains or amiable philanthropists. The
races admit of no mediocrity. Citizen Lasne
happened, luckily for his prisoners, to be a
large fat man, of the second or soft-hearted
category. His exterior was rugged and his
moustache was fierce. He was as stupid as
the libretto of an opera, and as vain as a
dabchick; but his nature was honest, simple,
confiding, and compassionate. He was the
foolish, fat scullion of Sterne metamorphosed
into a man. He would have spared a flea
when he caught him,—a three-bottle flea,
drunk with his life blood, and giddy with
leaping over his body. He would do
anything for a prisoner save allow him to escape,
—for, like all slow men, he had a fixed idea,
and this fixed idea confirmed him in, and
kept continually before him, the conviction
that one prisoner the less in the Temple
(unless legally discharged), was one head the
less upon his own shoulders. This is why he
always inspected the bolts, bars, and locks of
the doors and windows every night, set the
watch, and slept with the keys of the Temple
under his pillow.

Citizen Lasne liked drink. For port wine
he conceived an immoderate affection. His
liking for that beverage was pleasingly
gratified, as the Commodore frequently invited
him to his table. Misery makes us acquainted