Dick was allowed to walk, under guard, not only in the interior court, but also in a small garden on one of the bastions, where the pure air was sweetened by the perfume of flowers. He was permitted to have books, some of which were lent him by the governor, the royal intendant, the surgeon, and other officers, and some of which were bought, at his request, out of money allowed for his food. Could he have afforded it out of his own purse, he might have hired a servant, furnished his room luxuriously, dressed in the height of fashion, eaten of the choicest delicacies, practised music and participated in concerts got up under the governor's patronage, kept birds or cats or dogs, and otherwise brought to himself the world to which he was forbidden from going. The comforts of the Bastile, however, were at that time accessible to only about half a dozen prisoners besides Dick. In 1761 there had been only four. In 1789, when the Bastile was destroyed, there were only seven. But Dick, who lived in an age when young men of talent did not set upon leisure the value they give it in this overworking period, pined for the open. He began to grudge the time lost in captivity, and the fear grew on him that he was doomed indeed to forgetfulness. Summer came and went. The flowers in the elevated garden withered. Autumn winds howled around the towers, and winter snow was lodged on the lofty platforms. The beginning of December brought Dick, through the lieutenant of the Bastile garrison, the news that in America the British had taken Philadelphia, but that their Northern army, under Burgoyne, had surrendered at Saratoga, and that the glorious victory had been largely won by his own old commanders, Arnold and Morgan. Such tidings made Dick eager to be out in the world. At night he would fall asleep, gazing at the dying embers in his fireplace, and dream of broad fields, boundless stretches of varied country over which he could speed with bird-like swiftness, barely touching the ground with his feet. At last he resolved to uncage himself. The aperture that served as his cell window was defended by iron bars an inch thick, so crossing one another that each open space was but two inches square. There were three such gratings. As Dick was high up in the tower, the outer end of this aperture was at a great distance from the earth. Dick turned from this opening in despair, put out his fire, stooped into the fireplace, and examined the interior of the chimney. It was not very far from the bottom to the top, but the way was guarded by several iron bars and spikes, securely fixed in hard cement. They had the look of being less difficult to unfasten than the bars in the window seemed. Dick resolved to attack the obstructions in the chimney.