To vary his employment, Charney began to carve a thousand fanciful designs upon his wooden table! No school-boy ever mutilated his desk by such attempts at arabesque, both in relief and intaglio, as tasked his patience and address. The celebrated portal of the church of Candebee, and the pulpit and palm trees of St. Gudula at Brussels, are not adorned with a greater variety of figures. There were houses upon houses, fishes upon trees, men taller than steeples, boats upon roofs, carriages upon water, dwarf pyramids, and flies of gigantic stature,—horizontal, vertical, oblique, topsy-turvy, upside down, pell-mell, a chaos of hieroglyphics, in which he tried to discover a sense symbolical, an accidental intention, an occult design; for it was no great effort on the part of one who had so much faith in the power of chance, to expect the development of an epic poem in the sculptures on his table, or a design of Raphael in the veins of his box-wood snuff-box. It was the delight of his ingenuity to multiply difficulties for conquest, problems for solution, enigmas for divination; but even in the midst of these recreations, ennui, the formidable enemy, again surprised the captive. The man whose face he had noticed at the grated window might have afforded him food for conjecture, had he not seemed to avoid the observation of the Count, by retiring the moment Charney made his appearance; in consequence of which, he conceived an abhorrence of the recluse. Such was his opinion of the human species, that the stranger’s desire of concealment convinced him he was a spy, employed to watch the movements of the prisoners, or, perhaps, some former enemy, exulting over his humiliation. On interrogating the jailer, however, this last supposition was set at rest. [Illustration] “’Tis an Italian,” said Ludovico, the turnkey. “A good soul—and, what is more, a good Christian; for I often find him at his devotions.” Charney shrugged his shoulders: “And what may be the cause, pray, of his retention?” said he. “He attempted to assassinate the Emperor.” “Is he, then, a patriot?” “A patriot! Rubbish! Not he. But the poor soul had once a son and daughter: and _now_ he has only a daughter. The son was killed in Germany. A cannon-ball broke a tooth for him. _Povero figliuolo!_” “It was a paroxysm of selfishness, then, which moved this old man to become an assassin?” “You have never been a father, _Signor Conte_!” replied the jailer. “_Cristo Santo!_ if my Antonio, who is still a babe, were to eat his first mouthful for the good of this empire of the French (which is a bantling of his own age, or thereabouts), I’d soon—— But _basta_! I’ve no mind to take up my lodging at Fenestrella, except as it may be with the keys at my girdle or under my pillow.” “And how does this fierce conspirator amuse himself in prison?” persisted Charney. “Catching flies!” replied the jailer, with an ironical wink.