to the castle of Vincennes, where they were cooped up in narrow cells, with windows too high to see out of. Four months later they were carted back to Paris, to the Austin nunnery. On their liberation they managed, by the sale of their linen and furniture, to leave for England, where they found a new home, first in Dorsetshire and ultimately in Staffordshire.
The Conceptionists in the Rue Charenton, very near the Bastille, were removed to the Austin convent in November 1794, and shared its alarms and privations. On their release they petitioned the Convention, giving a lamentable picture of their condition. "While prisoners we were at least sure of food, but we are now reduced to starvation, subsisting only on the scanty alms of charitable persons acquainted with our situation. Our property is not restored; we are despoiled of everything. We have no family, and shall have no country if the Republic abandons us. You will not suffer despair to reduce us to regret having escaped the axe of assassins. Grant us temporary shelter and succour until you have decided whether our property shall be restored. We shall not cease to bless your justice, and to cry 'Vive la République Française, vive la Convention Rationale.'" This appeal seems to have secured them a temporary allowance of two francs per head daily, and in 1797 Captain Swinburne found them tolerably comfortable, their convent having been restored to them, though in a dilapidated state. They
