and gens-d'armes, with sticks, who bade us
pack up and prepare to march. We expected
change of quarters, but were marched into a
meadow, and there ordered to strip. We
were searched rigidly; everything that we
had of value, our watches and even our
money, was taken from us, except an
allowance of tenpiece a-piece for necessary
extras to each person; and to me, as having
held chief rank, the sum of half-a-crown.
The reason assigned for these proceedings
was the plundering by many of our soldiers
in the last days of the siege; for the recovery
of stolen property search had been made, the
town authorities assisting, through all the
prisons and upon the person of all prisoners.
The result was, that in several casemates—
especially those occupied by the artillerymen—
much stolen property was found. For this reason
we suffered insult and were robbed in turn.
The rueful and indignant posse of staff officers
in shirts and drawers must have very much
amused our searchers, who, when they had done
their bidding, pointed to a heap of old clothes,
worn-out uniforms of common soldiers of the
Baden army, out of which they bade us fit
ourselves with garments. Old Colonel K.,
shaking with agitation of mind, grumbled in
his beard that he had been among Turks and
Moors, but never before had seen conduct
like this. The Baden private soldiers are a
lean race, and poor K. laboured in vain to
get a portly person into any of the trousers
placed at his disposal.

When we were all back in our kennel, we had
several hours' amusement at the expense of
one another. We were grotesque spectacles;
most grotesque of all, our scrupulous friend
S., whose handsome figure and neat dress
had always been the envy of his clumsier
companions. He had arrayed himself in a
common soldier's jacket much darned, with
exceedingly short sleeves, and reaching
not quite to the waist, with only three
buttons; trousers darned and patched in
many places, ending not very far below his
knees, wholly destitute of buttons, and slung
over the shoulders with a piece of pack-
thread. Old K. was still grumbling and
trying impossibilities, while Major W., in
a recruit's old clothes, pushed his cap back
on his head, and practised the goose-step
with great relish. The comedy became a
tragedy next morning, when we discovered
that these clothes were infested with vermin.

A day or two afterwards, I received orders
from an officer to pack up and follow him. I
did so with a heavy heart, for this looked
like the beginning of the end. Before the
postern I was detained to await the coming
of another prisoner, who proved to be a
gentleman well known and honoured in
England—Dr. Kinkel.* He had been fellow
deputy with me at Berlin in the second
democratic congress. I did not know that this
good poet and able man had been in Baden,
still less did I know that he was prisoner.
We were led to the same bastion, but not
quartered together. I was to replace, in a
casemate on the second floor, a comrade who
had just been shot. This chamber was built
for prisoners, and its first inmate had been
M. von Struve. My companion in it was a
Bavarian major, who was confidently
expecting to be indulged by his own government
with a few years' arrest, as his offence
had stopped short at the quitting of his
regiment. The hope was vain. He was
delivered up and shot. My position by change
to this prison was again improved. We had
pallets upon which to sleep, were allowed
to procure books, and could get dinners
from the town. There was also a yard in
which we met other prisoners when suffered
to take our daily airing.

* See Household Words, Vol. ii., page 121.

One afternoon while I was confined here,
Dr. Kinkel called to me; and, when I came to
the window, told me that my wife was
coming. She had written to me to die rather
than fall into the hands of the Prussians; but,
having fallen into their hands, was determined
that I should not die if woman's zeal
and devotion could prevent it. She had
travelled to Potsdam; she had pleaded for
my life with many influential persons; but
they all told her that my destiny was in the
hands of the generals at Baden. To Baden,
therefore, she went next, and, being near me,
spent her time almost incessantly on the
road between Rastadt and Baden Baden,
where she appealed to the General, Count G.
Thence, too, she journeyed constantly to
Carlsruhe, Mannheim, every place to which
the least glimmer of hope enticed her.

Then it was that the desire became strong
in me to save the life she valued. I wrote to
General Count G., reminding him of his
unsought promise to remember me if we
completed without disorder the affair of the
surrender. I even planned escape and ground
upon our stones a rough key made of an iron
hook torn from a shutter of the guard-house.
It would turn one bolt of our lock, by the
time that I learnt by a letter from Count G.,
and by report of others that he had been
honourably mindful of his promise; that he
had interceded for me with the grand duke;
and that he meant again to do so. I wrote
the good news to my wife, and began hoping.

My preliminary examination was conducted
by a Baden judge, who acted with great
fairness. Unfortunately, the late governor's
historical documents were chiefly in my
handwriting. I was charged, especially, with having
commanded the bombardment of the Prussians
in Ludwigshaven—opposite Mannheim—and
with having delayed, by my speeches and
actions, the surrender of Rastadt. Legal
proofs would still have been difficult to bring
against me if my adjutant in Mannheim had
not—being absent in prison—received the
news of the surrender of Rastadt as evidence