with the authorities, to run risks, to know he was spied upon, &c. He had no political convictions then or later, but he was an enthusiast in the cause of liberty, and always belonged to the Opposition, whatever the Government of the moment might be; he was religious under the Republic, a freethinker under the Empire, &c., &c. The despotism of the First Consul so exasperated him that at the age of twenty he wrote an ode against him entitled _La Napoléone_. Arrests were made right and left in the hope of finding the author, and when at last the printer was imprisoned, Nodier gave himself up. After several months' imprisonment in Paris he was sent back to his native town, where he was placed under the surveillance of the police. This was the beginning of a long series of persecutions and annoyances on the part of the Government, which, although certainly exaggerated by the young poet's lively and always active imagination, must have been anything but pleasant to him. He went from one hiding-place to another in the Jura Mountains, living and writing in unfrequented spots, and never staying long enough in any one place to complete the work begun there. Thus, in addition to all the impressions of the period already received, he had experience, at a very early age, of the emotions of the exile and the mood of the _émigré_. It is these moods and emotions which form the background of his first literary attempt. _Le Peintre de Saltzbourg_ was written during his incessant changes of abode among the Jura Mountains.