refused him. He had a passion for lace and fine linen; he amused himself with a guitar; and his table was furnished with the best. The governor rarely sat down in his presence. An old doctor of the Bastille, who had often attended this interesting prisoner, said that, although he had examined his tongue and the rest of his body, he had never seen his face. He was admirably made, said the doctor, and-his skin was of a brownish tint. He spoke charmingly, with a voice of a deeply impressive quality, never complaining of his lot, and never letting it be guessed who he was. This unknown captive died in 1703, and was buried by night in the parish of S. Paul. What is doubly astonishing is this: that when he was sent to Ste. Marguerite there did not disappear from Europe any personage of note. But observe what happened within a few days of his arrival at the isle. The governor himself laid the prisoner's table and then withdrew and locked the door. One day the prisoner wrote something with a knife on a silver plate and threw the plate out of the window towards a boat on the shore, almost at the foot of the tower. A fisherman to whom the boat belonged picked up the plate and carried it to the governor, who, surprised beyond measure, asked the man: ’Have you read what is written on this plate, and has any one seen it in your hands?' 'I cannot read,' answered the fisherman; 'I have only just found it, and no one else has seen it.' He was detained until the governor had made sure that he could not read, and that no other person had seen the plate. 'Go,' he then said. 'It is well for you that you cannot read.'"
How Voltaire could describe the prisoner as "with features of rare nobility and beauty," when he was invariably masked, so that no one could see his face, is certainly remarkable.
When Voltaire found that this story had created a sensation, he vouchsafed a solution to it. "The Iron
