From certain particulars, which we find in various memoirs, it would seem that, generally speaking, more indulgences were granted to the inmates of the Bastile in former days, than during the last thirty years of its existence. At all times, however, much would undoubtedly depend on the personal character of the governor; if he chanced to be liberal-minded and humane, he would, as far as he could venture to do so, mitigate the sufferings of his captives; if, on the contrary, he were greedy of gain, and harsh in his disposition, he would stint and deteriorate their diet, wantonly deny them even the most trifling comforts, and, in short, do his best to make the management of the prison “render life a burthen,” which, with an impudent candour, one of the officers of the castle avowed to be its especial purpose. It must be owned that, in some respects, modern times witnessed an improvement in the practice of the Bastile. The cages, which it is known once to have contained, were removed. The rack, also, and other instruments of torture, ceased to be called into use. At what period the change took place is not said. That, in the latter end of Louis the Thirteenth’s reign, the instruments still existed in the castle, we learn from the Memoirs of the faithful La Porte, who saw them, and was threatened with them to extort a confession. What the Bastile was in its mildest form will appear from the following narrative, written by a person who was confined for eight months. “About five in the morning of the 2d of April, 1771,” says the narrator, “I was awakened by a violent knocking at my chamber door, and was commanded, in the name of the king, to open it. I did so, and an exempt of the police, three men who appeared to be under his orders, and a commissary, entered the room. They desired me to dress myself, and began to search the apartment. They ordered me to open my drawers, and having examined my papers, they took such as they chose, and put them into a box, which, as I understood afterwards, was carried to the police office. The commissary asked me my name, my age, the place where I was born, how long I had been at Paris, and the manner in which I spent my time. The examination was written down by him; a list was made of every thing found in the room, which, together with the examination, I was desired to read and sign. The exempt then told me to take all my body linen, and such clothes as I chose, and to come along with them. At the word _all_ I started; I guessed where they were about to take me, and it seemed to announce to me a long train of misery.