No constituted authority, no branch of the civil or military administration, might retain in its service a conscript who was called upon in his turn. No Frenchman, being, or having been, liable to the conscription, could hold any public office, or receive any public salary, or exercise public rights, or receive a legacy, or inherit property, unless he produced a certificate that he had conformed to the law, and either was actually in service, or had obtained his dismissal, or was legally exempted, or that his services had not been required. They who failed to join the army within the time prescribed were deprived of their civil rights, a circular description of their persons was sent to all the chiefs of the _gendarmerie_ throughout the empire, and they were pursued as deserters. Eleven depôts were appointed, where these refractory conscripts were disciplined in an uniform of disgrace, with the hair cut close: they were employed upon the fortifications, or in other hard labour, for which they received no additional pay or rations. This, however, was thought too lenient when the emperor’s expenditure of men became more lavish, and it was then decreed that such offenders were to be punished as if they had actually deserted. ♦PUNISHMENTS FOR DESERTION.♦ A deserter was condemned to a fine of fifteen hundred francs, chargeable upon whatever property might fall to him at any future time, if he was not able to pay it immediately. In addition to this fine, the punishment for the simple offence of deserting into the interior was three years’ labour upon the public works. The culprits wore a particular uniform, and were allowed shoes; their heads were shaved every eighth day, and they were not permitted either to shave their beards or to cut them. Their rations were the soldiers’ bread, rice, or dry pulse; their pay half that of a common labourer; and of this a third was withheld till they should have served out their time, a third was deducted for their expenses, and the remainder was all which they had for purchasing better food than their miserable allowance. He who had deserted from the army, or a frontier place, or in a direction toward the enemy, or with a companion, or who had scaled ramparts in effecting his escape, was sentenced to public labour for ten years, with a bullet of eight pounds weight fastened to him by a chain eight feet long. He was to work eight hours a day during five months, ten during the better part of the year, and to be chained in prison all the rest of the time: he wore wooden shoes, and an uniform differing both in colour and fashion from that of the troops; his mustachios, as well as his head, were shaved every eight days; his beard was never shaved, nor shorn, nor shortened; his rations and pay were like those of the common deserters, because, indeed, life could not be supported upon less. The punishment of death, which was inflicted upon those who had deserted to the enemy, and in other