Strona 643 z 896

Greater things than the Doctor had at that time to contend with,

would have yielded before his persevering purpose. While he kept

himself in his place, as a physician, whose business was with all

degrees of mankind, bond and free, rich and poor, bad and good,

he used his personal influence so wisely, that he was soon the

inspecting physician of three prisons, and among them of La

Force. He could now assure Lucie that her husband was no longer

confined alone, but was mixed with the general body of prisoners;

he saw her husband weekly, and brought sweet messages to her,

straight from his lips; sometimes her husband himself sent a

letter to her (though never by the Doctor's hand), but she was

not permitted to write to him: for, among the many wild

suspicions of plots in the prisons, the wildest of all pointed at

emigrants who were known to have made friends or permanent

connections abroad.