The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle
The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle Peregrine at once conceived the meaning of this arrest, and it was well for him that he had no weapon wherewith to stand upon his defence; for such was the impetuosity and rashness of his temper, that, had he been armed, he would have run all risks rather than surrender himself to any odds whatever; but Pallet, imagining that the officer was some gentleman who had mistaken their carriage for his own, desired his friend to undeceive the stranger; and when he was informed of the real state of their condition, his knees began to shake, his teeth to chatter, and he uttered a most doleful lamentation, importing his fear of being carried to some hideous dungeon of the Bastille, where he should spend the rest of his days in misery and horror, and never see the light of God's sun, nor the face of a friend; but perish in a foreign land, far removed from his family and connexions. Pickle d—d him for his pusillanimity; and the exempt hearing a lady bemoan herself so piteously, expressed his mortification at being the instrument of giving her such pain, and endeavoured to console them by representing the lenity of the French government, and the singular generosity of the prince, by whose order they were apprehended.