Victor Dubourg

gistfile1.txt

1679 A news writer in Holland who had presumed to print some very
severe and sarcastic reflections on Madame Maintenon and Louis XIV
suffered the following severe punishment. Some months after this
offence he was induced by a person sent expressly for the purpose to
make a tour into French Flanders. The instant he had quitted the Dutch
territories, he was put under arrest and immediately, by his majesty's
express command, conducted to Mount St Michael, then one of the state
prisons of France. He was shut up in a wooden cage comprising about
twelve feet square and twenty feet in height. Here he lived upwards of
three and twenty years; and here he at length expired. During the long
nights of winter no candle or fire was allowed him; nor was he
permitted to have any book. He saw no human face except the jailor who
came once every day to present him through a hole in the wicket with
his little portion of bread and wine; no instrument was given him with
which he could destroy himself; but he found means at length to draw
out a nail from the wood, with which he cut or engraved on the bars of
his cage, certain fleurs de lis, and armorial bearings, which formed his
only employment and recreation.