74 CARNOT. 



him over to Nyon. It was already very late ; the con- 

 stables of the Directory were watching their prey. Our 

 colleague goes direct to his host, and, without any pre- 

 amble, asks pardon for having introduced himself into 

 his house under a false name. " I am proscribed, I am 

 Carnot, they are going to arrest me ; my fate is in your 

 hands : will you save me ? " said he. The honest laun- 

 dryman replied, " Without any doubt." Immediately 

 he muffled up Carnot with a blouse, with a cotton cap, 

 with a dossier ; he lays on his head a large loose 

 bundle of dirty linen, which hung down to the shoulders 

 of the pretended Jacob, and hid his figure. By favour 

 of such a disguise, the man who a short time before by 

 writing a few lines could scatter or arrest in their march 

 armies commanded by a Marceau, a Hoche, a Moreau, a 

 Bonaparte ; to shed hope or fear at Naples, at Rome, at 

 Vienna ; now melancholy vicissitude of things here 

 below, having borrowed the trappings of a laundry- 

 man's labourer, reaches in safety the little boat, in which 

 he is to escape from being sent a prisoner back to France. 

 In the boat, a new and strange emotion awaited Carnot. 

 In the boatman appointed by M. Didier he recognizes 

 that same Pichegru, whose culpable intrigues had per- 

 haps rendered the 18th Fructidor inevitable. During 

 all the time occupied in crossing the lake, not a single 

 word was exchanged between the two proscribed men. 

 Indeed, the time, the place, the circumstances were not 

 suitable for political debates, for recriminations ! Car- 

 not, moreover, had soon to congratulate himself on his 

 reserve ; on reading the French journals at Nyon, he 

 learnt that he had been deceived by a fortuitous resem- 

 blance ; that his travelling companion, far from being a 

 general, had never manoeuvred any thing more than his 



