Page:Memoirs of Vidocq, Volume 3.djvu/145

 conceived a means of vengeance, which did not succeed. Feigning repentance, he sent for a priest, and under the pretence of a general confession, avowed the commission of various robberies, in which I was (of course) implicated. The confessor, to whom my pretended participation had not been communicated under the seal of secresy, addressed the prefecture by letter, in which I was violently inculpated; but Gosnet's confession had not the hoped-for result.

It was the despotism exercised over the thieves which propagated amongst them the system of denouncing each other, and to thrust them (if I may be allowed the expression) to the height of demoralization. Formerly they composed, in the bosom of society, a society apart, which included neither traitors nor deserters; but when they were proscribed en masse, instead of closing their ranks, they in their fright gave a cry of alarm, which rendered every expedient for personal safety legitimate, even to the injury of ancient faith. The chain which united the family of malefactors once broken, each made no scruple of denouncing his comrades to ensure his own safety. At the approach of particular periods, which were marked as convicting epochs, such as new year's day, the fête of the emperor, or any other ceremony, denunciations poured thick as hail upon the second division. To escape what the agents termed the sweeping order, that is to say, the order for apprehending all individuals reputed robbers, it was who should be first to furnish the police with useful information. There was no lack of suspected persons, who hastened to prove themselves liege subjects by turning spies upon their comrades, whose abodes were not known; and thus, ere long, the prisons were completely filled. We may justly imagine, that in these general battues, it was impossible to prevent a multitude of abuses: most iniquitous breaches of justice occurred, and frequently without chance of reparation. Unfortunate mechanics, who, at the expiration of a simple correctional punishment, returned to their trade, and endea-