The Duc D'Enghien and his aid-de-camp were forwarded with the utmost speed to Paris; the remainder of us were imprisoned at Strassburg. What became of my companions I know not; but I was sent on, along with a number of others, about a month later, to Nancy, to be tried by a military commission. I may mention it here, as a singular fact illustrating the secrecy of the period, that it was not till long after this time I learned the terrible fate of the poor Prince de Condé. Had I known it, it is more than probable that I should have utterly despaired of my own safety. The dreadful story of Vincennes--the mock trial, and the midnight execution--are all too well known to my readers; nor is it necessary I should refer to an event, on which I myself can throw no new light. That the sentence was determined on before his arrest--and that the grave was dug while the victim was still sleeping the last slumber before "the sleep that knows not waking"--the evidences are strong and undeniable. But an anecdote which circulated at the time, and which, so far as I know, has never appeared in print, would seem to show that there was complicity, at least, in the crime, and that the secret was not confined to the First Consul's breast. On that fatal night of the 20th March, Talleyrand was seated at a card-table at Caulaincourt's house at Paris. The party was about to rise from play, when suddenly the "pendule" on the chimney-piece struck two. It was in one of those accidental pauses in the conversation when any sound is heard with unusual distinctness. Talleyrand started, as he heard it, and then turning to Caulaincourt, whispered, "Yes; 'tis all over now?" words which, accidentally overheard, without significance, were yet to convey a terrible meaning when the dreadful secret of that night was disclosed. If the whole of Europe was convulsed by the enormity of this crime--the foulest that stains the name of Bonaparte--the Parisians soon forgot it, in the deeper interest of the great event that was now approaching--the assumption of the imperial title by Napoleon. The excitement on this theme was so great and absorbing, that nothing else was spoken or thought of. Private sorrows and afflictions were disregarded and despised, and to obtrude one's hardships on the notice of others seemed, at this juncture, a most ineffable selfishness. That I, a prisoner, friendless and unknown as I was, found none to sympathize with me or take interest in my fate, is, therefore, nothing extraordinary. In fact, I appeared to have been entirely forgotten; and though still in durance, nothing was said either of the charge to be preferred against me, nor the time when I should be brought to trial.