Schiller was greatly concerned at the prisoner’s ailing condition. He had grown rapidly worse, was tormented with a terrible cough and was evidently in a state of high fever. Medical advice was urgently needed, but the prison doctor called only three times a week and he had visited the gaol the day before; not even the arrival of these new prisoners, nor an urgent summons to prescribe for serious sickness, would cause him to change his routine. Pellico had no mattress and it could only be supplied on medical requisition. The superintendent, cringing and timid, did not dare to issue it on his own responsibility. He came to see Pellico, and felt his pulse, but declared he could not go beyond the rules. “I should risk my appointment,” he pleaded, “if I exceeded my powers.” Schiller, after the superintendent left, was indignant with his chief. “I think I would have taken as much as this upon myself; it is only a small matter, scarcely involving the safety of the empire,” and Pellico gratefully acknowledged that he had found a real friend in the seemingly surly warder. Schiller came again that night to visit him and finding him worse, renewed his bitter complaints against the cruel neglect of the doctor. The next day the prisoner was still left without medical treatment, after a night of terrible pain and discomfort, which caused him to perspire freely. “I should like to change my shirt,” he suggested, but was told that it was impossible. It was a prison shirt and only one each week was allowed. Schiller brought one of his own which proved to be several times too large. The prisoner asked for one of his own, as he had brought a trunk full of his clothes, but this too was forbidden. He was permitted to wear no part of his own clothing and was left to lie as he was, shivering in every limb. Schiller came presently, bringing a loaf of black bread, the allowance for two days, and after handing it over burst out into fresh imprecations against the doctor. Pellico could not eat a morsel of this coarse food, nor of his dinner, which was presently brought by a prisoner and consisted of some nauseous soup, the smell of which alone was repulsive, and some vegetables dressed with a detestable sauce. He forced down a few spoonfuls of soup and again fell back upon his bare, comfortless bed, which was unprovided with a pillow; and racked with pain in every limb, he lay there half insensible, looking for little relief. At last, on the third day, the doctor came and pronounced the illness to be fever, recommending that the patient should be removed from his cell to another up-stairs. The first answer was that no room could be found, but when the matter was specially referred to the governor who ruled the two provinces of Moravia and Silesia and resided at Brünn, he insisted that the doctor’s advice should be followed. Accordingly the patient was moved into a room above, lighted by a small barred window