The word Bastile, which has now long been, and will ever remain, a term of opprobrious import, to designate the dungeons of arbitrary power, has, like many other words, deviated widely in the lapse of years from its original meaning. Its derivation is traced, somewhat doubtfully, to the Italian _bastia_ or _bastione_. In former times, it was applied to any fort, whether permanent or temporary. In our old writers, as well as in those of France, we find it repeatedly given to field works. The redoubts, for instance, by means of which, in the reign of the sixth Henry, the English blockaded Orleans, are so denominated by French chroniclers. The same is the case with respect to more durable works; there were, at an early period, no less than three bastiles at Paris, those of St. Denis, the Temple, and St. Anthony, all of which were situated to the north of the Seine. Eventually, the name was confined to the last of these buildings. The quadrangular castle of St. Denis was demolished in 1671; but the tower of the Temple, in which the unfortunate Louis the Sixteenth and his family were confined, outlasted the Bastile itself for nearly a quarter of a century, and was used as a state prison till 1811, when it ceased to exist. The bastile of St. Anthony—which structure I shall henceforth mention only as The Bastile—is generally supposed to have been founded by Hugh Aubriot. This opinion is, however, erroneous. It is beyond a doubt, that the original plan and construction of it must be assigned to the celebrated Stephen Marcel, provost of the merchants of Paris. When, in 1356, after the disastrous battle of Poitiers, the English detachments were ravaging the vicinity of the French capital, and the citizens were filled with terror, Stephen undertook to repair the dilapidated bulwarks of the city, and add other defences. Among his additions was a gate, fortified with towers on each side, leading from the suburb of St. Anthony into the street of the same name. These towers must be considered as the first rudiments of the Bastile.