Page:Memoirs of Vidocq, Volume 2.djvu/232

 of memory I recalled to mind one Germain, alias Royer, alias "the Captain," who had been an intimate acquaintance of Noel's, and although our similarity was very slight, yet I determined on personating him.

Germain, as well as myself, had often escaped from the Bagnes, and that was the only point of resemblance between us: he was about my age, but a smaller framed man; he had dark brown hair, mine was light; he was thin, and I tolerably stout; his complexion was sallow, and mine fair, with a very clear skin; besides, Germain had an excessively long nose, took a vast deal of snuff, which begriming his nostrils outside, and stuffing them up within, gave him a peculiarly nasal tone of voice.

I had much to do in personating Germain; but the difficulty did not deter me: my hair cut, a là [sic] mode des Bagnes, was dyed black, as well as my beard, after it had attained a growth of eight days; to embrown my countenance I washed it with walnut liquor; and to perfect the imitation, I garnished my upper lip thickly with a kind of coffee grounds, which I plastered on by means of gum arabic, and thus became as nasal in my twang as Germain himself. My feet were doctored with equal care; I made blisters on them by rubbing in a certain composition of which I had obtained the recipe at Brest. I also made the marks of the fetters; and when all my toilet was finished, dressed myself in the suitable garb, I had neglected nothing which could complete the metamorphosis, neither the shoes nor the marks of those horrid letters G A L. The costume was perfect; and the only thing wanting was a hundred of those companionable insects which people the solitudes of poverty, and which were, I believe, together with locusts and toads, one of the seven plagues of old Egypt. I procured some for money; and as soon as they were a little accustomed to their new domicile, which was speedily the case, I directed my steps towards the residence of madame Noel, in the Rue Ticquetonne.