Page:FourteenMonthsInAmericanBastiles-2.djvu/12

12 solid doors, The inner, or back rooms, if rooms they can be called, were considerably smaller than the others, and were simply vaulted chambers of rough stone, whitewashed. — They were each lighted by a single, deep embrasure, which, at the narrowest part, was about forty-four by twenty-two inches. Just beneath these embrasures was the moat, which at that point was more than fifty feet in width. On the opposite side of the moat a sentinel was constantly stationed. The two back rooms and one of the front ones we used as sleeping apartments, each being occupied by five persons. — In the other front room we took our meals. Bedsteads and bedding were furnished us, which, I believe, were obtained from the Hygeia Hotel, just outside the walls. About 10 o'clock one of the Sergeants of the Provost Marshal visited us, and carefully searched our baggage. Our meals were sent from the Hotel also, and worse, as we at that time thought, could not well have been offered us. The regulations to which we were subjected, were not only unnecessarily rigorous, but seemed to have been framed with the deliberate purpose of adding petty insults to our other annoyances. We were required to leave the room when the servants who brought our meals were engaged in setting the table, although a Sergeant of the Guard was always present at such times, to prevent our holding any conversation with them; We were notified, by an order from General also, that the knives and forks were to be counted after each meal. It is difficult to conceive for what rational purpose such a rule was made. Fifteen of us would scarcely have thought of assailing the thousands of troops who composed the garrison, with such weapons as might have been snatched from the table; and, closely guarded as we were, it was hardly possible that we could have effected our escape, had we thought of doing so, by means of such implements as knives and forks. The order was one, therefore, which could only have been intended to humiliate us, and it was certainly such as no one having the instincts of a gentleman, or the better feelings of a man, would have suggested or enforced. It was, however, in accordance with the theory upon which General thought proper to deal with us throughout.