consequently the prisoners had for some time to go bare-headed. In 1544 the Archbishop of Bourges sent a couple of priests and two other clerks to the captain of the galleys at Toulon, and required him to put them to hard labour. But this was regarded by the Parliament as an infringement of its rights, and the captain was ordered to send the clerics back to the archbishop.
Men were condemned to the galleys for every sort of crime and fault. Many a wretched Huguenot toiled at the oar. Often enough a nobleman laboured beside a man belonging to the dregs of the people. Haudriquer de Blancourt, in love with a lady of good rank, to flatter her made a false entry in her pedigree, so as to enhance her nobility. There ensued an outcry among heralds, and for this De Blancourt was sent to the galleys.
As naval construction and science improved, oars were no longer employed, and sails took their places; the galleys were moored at Toulon, Brest and Roquefort, and acquired the name of Bagnes. The derivation is uncertain. By some it is supposed to be derived from the Provençal bagna, which signifies "moored," by others from the prisons of the slaves near the Bagno, or baths of the seraglio at Constantinople.
Louis XVI. abolished torture, which had filled the Bagne with cripples. Thenceforth the Bagne ceased to be an infirmary of martyrs, and became a workshop of vigorous labourers. The Revolution of 1789 tore up all the old codes, but it maintained the galleys, only it changed the name of Galerien to Travaux forcés à temps, ou à perpetuité. No one formerly seemed to be sensible to the horrible brutality of the
