Thanks to Silvio Pellico's charming prison records, this pretender's story can be continued, and in a more truthful fashion. In the same prison of Ste. Marguerite, where the Italian author was confined, was also held in durance vile the _soi disant_ Duke of Normandy. The two captives became acquainted, and the Frenchman, by this time probably grown a half believer in his own imposture, declaimed so strongly against his "uncle," Louis the Eighteenth, the usurper of his rights, that Pellico appears to have been partly converted, whilst the jailers were quite convinced of the authenticity of the prisoner's claims. These guardians of the cells had seen so many changes of fortune during the last few years, that it appeared to them by no means improbable that one day their "royal" captive might leave his prison for a throne; having this belief in view, they granted the pretender everything available save freedom. In 1825, the Austrians, deeming, doubtless, his "Royal Highness" had had sufficient time to disabuse himself of his belief, released him after a captivity of more than six years and a half. The pretender took himself off to Switzerland, where he made some dupes; and in 1826 re-entered France. Grown prudent, however, he concealed his royalty under the name of Hébert, and under that cognomen obtained employment in the Préfecture of Rouen. As Colonel Gustave he appeared in Paris, in 1827, and in the following year reasserted his rights, as the following communication addressed to the Chamber of Peers shows:-- "LUXEMBOURG, 2 _February_, 1828. "NOBLE PEERS,--Organs of justice, it is to your exalted wisdom that the unfortunate Louis Charles de Bourbon, Duke of Normandy, confides his interests. Saved, as by a miracle, from the hands of his ferocious assassins, and after having languished for several years in various countries of the globe, he addresses himself to your noble lordships. "He does not reclaim the throne of his father; it belongs to the nation, which alone possesses the right to dispose of it. He only demands from your justice an asylum for his head--which he cannot repose anywhere without peril--and in a country which more than thirty years of exile have not caused him to forget. "THE DUKE OF NORMANDY." The only apparent result of this appeal was the proposition made by Baron Mounier to the Chamber, that for the future no petition should be received of which the petitioner's signature had not been legally recognized, and which was not presented by a peer.