“You may remember, B----, the kindness which many of the prisoners experienced from the inhabitants at Verdun, and the tender attachments that united numbers of youthful hearts together, softening the loss of liberty, and lightening the bonds of imprisonment. Can you forget Adele,--the beautiful, blooming, innocent Adele? Do you not recollect the first time we saw her at the gathering in of the vintage, when her luxuriant auburn hair was entwined with the green leaves of the vine, and she presided as the queen of the festival? Have you forgotten the sweet voice that warbled forth such strains of harmony? Yes! you may forget, but I never can. “From that moment I loved Adele; from that moment our hearts were firmly knit together, and every interview served to strengthen our fond regard. She was an orphan, her parents had perished in the sanguinary conflicts of the revolution, and she now resided with a widowed aunt, whose only daughter had pledged her affection to our fellow-prisoner, Robinson. Euphemia was light-hearted, gay, and full of spirit; Adele was firm, cheerful, and enthusiastic, but at times a deep melancholy overshadowed her disposition, nor would she reveal the cause. “A few months after our first acquaintance, several officers had broken their parole and escaped, the consequence was a rigid restriction on the freedom of the rest; but still money at all times could overcome the watchfulness of the guard. One evening, Robinson and myself had bribed the _gens d’armes_ to permit our straying as far as the vineyard. We found Euphemia at the cottage, but Adele had walked to the verge of the grounds near the town, expecting our approach, and as we had been compelled to enter them by another path, she was not aware of our arrival. I immediately hastened towards the spot where I expected to find her, when a low murmuring sound followed by a faint shriek, arrested my steps. They were repeated still louder, and the sound directed me to the place from whence they proceeded. The cry of distress was enough for a British heart, and forgetting my situation as a prisoner, forgetting every thing but that some one stood in need of my assistance, I rushed forward. The shrieks continued, though fainter, and in a few seconds I reached the spot where Adele, my own sweet Adele, was struggling with a brute in human form. In an instant he was prostrate at my feet, and the fainting, innocent maiden clasped to my breast; but turning my eyes towards the wretch who thus had forfeited all pretensions to the character of man, I saw my fate was sealed,--it was the infamous, the cruel Wirrion.