The packet flung into the sea was cast back by it on the beach of Notre-Dame-d'Alloue, near Valognes. The papers contained in this packet served as documents for the conviction: there were thirty-two of them. Quintal, returning to the sands of Brittany with his boat to fetch Armand, had also, through an obstinate fatality, been shipwrecked in Norman waters a few days before my cousin. The crew of Quintal's boat had spoken; the Prefect of Saint-Lô had learnt that M. de Chateaubriand was the leader of the Princes' enterprises. When he heard that a cutter manned with only two men had run ashore, he had no doubt that Armand was one of the two shipwrecked men, for all the fishermen spoke of him as the most fearless man at sea that had ever been known. [Sidenote: Arrest of Armand.] On the 20th of January 1809, the Prefect of the Manche reported Armand's arrest to the general police. His letter commences: "My conjectures have been completely verified: Chateaubriand is arrested; it was he who landed on the coast at Bretteville and who had taken the name of 'John Fall.' "Uneasy at finding that, in spite of the very precise orders which I had given, John Fall did not arrive at Saint-Lô, I instructed Quarter-master Mauduit of the gendarmes, a trustworthy and extremely active man, to go to fetch this John Fall, wherever he might be, and bring him before me, in whatever condition he was. He found him at Coutances, at the moment when they were arranging to transfer him to the hospital, to treat him for his legs, which were frozen. "Fall appeared before me to-day. I had had Lelièvre put in a separate room, from which he could see John Fall arrive without being observed. When Lelièvre saw him come up a flight of steps placed near this apartment, he cried, striking his hands together and changing colour: "'It's Chateaubriand! However did they catch him?' "Lelièvre was in no way forewarned. This exclamation was drawn from him by surprise. He asked me afterwards not to say that he had mentioned Chateaubriand's name, because he would be lost. "I did not let John Fall see that I knew who he was." Armand, carried to Paris and lodged at the Force, underwent a secret interrogation at the military gaol of the Abbaye. General Hulin, who was now Military Commander of Paris, appointed Bertrand, a captain in the first demi-brigade of veterans, judge-advocate of the military commission instructed, by a decree of the 25th of February, to inquire into Armand's case. The persons implicated were M. de Goyon[25], who had been sent by Armand to Brest, and M. de Boisé-Lucas the Younger, charged to hand letters from Henry-Larivière to Messieurs Laya[26] and Sicard[27] in Paris. In a letter of the 13th of March, addressed to Fouché, Armand said: