It will be in the recollection of the reader that the British Government provided the clothing of their subjects who were captives in a foreign prison of war. The dress is described by the author of the article in _Chambers’ Journal_ as a gray jacket and trousers and a straw hat; it contrasted favourably with the suit of many colours in which our Government clad their French prisoners. In the paragraphs in which the article deals with the British prisoners in Denmark, the anonymous writer shows a sympathy with Denmark which may account for the severe language in which he deals with the British prisoners in that country. In describing their gambling propensities and consequent moral depravity he uses almost the actual words used by Captain Woodriff and others when they described Les Misérables and their class in the English prisons. Possibly some future searcher in the bypaths of history may take up the subject of British prisoners of war in the countries of their captors, and we may hope that the result of his researches will form a picture of our countrymen more agreeable to the British eye than that depicted by the writer in _Chambers’ Journal_. {238} CHAPTER XII THE TRUCE AND THE PEACE—PRISON EVACUATED, 1802—FINALLY CLEARED, 1814—DEMOLISHED, 1816 Joyous presage of ultimate bliss For the heart long depressed by vain yearning; Timely token of pardon—the kiss That reviveth Faith’s innermost burning; Peace prevailing o’er War’s artifice, Love o’er Hate, and delight over Mourning. NORMAN HILL, _Lingering Winter_. WITH what feverish anxiety must the occupants of the courts and caserns of Norman Cross have listened to the garbled accounts of the progress of the war which reached their ears towards the close of the eighteenth and the dawn of the nineteenth centuries. How their hopes must have been raised when they heard of the defeat of the Austrians by Moreau at Hohenlinden, of the sudden crossing of the Alps by their hero Buonaparte, his swoop on to another Austrian army and its defeat at Marengo. When they learned that in 1800 Austria had signed a Treaty of Peace with France (The Treaty of Lunéville, Feb. 1801) and that England was left to fight single-handed, they must have thought delivery extremely near. To cheer them further would come the news of the alliance of Russia, Denmark, Sweden, and Prussia to constitute “the armed neutrality,” which though not actually at war with Great Britain, was formed to check her progress and paralyse her navy. The time when the French Army would have England under its foot and the prison doors would be thrown open must be close at hand.