The Bastille is remembered through Lucien de Barenton, Count de Chrétien’s bitter comparison between his earlier confinement there and his present circumstances at sea. Though mentioned only briefly, it marks a prior episode of Louis XIV’s control over Lucien and becomes a measure of how severely the voyage has worn him down.

Lucien’s Recollection

Aboard the rolling ship, Lucien says he wishes Louis XIV had left him in the Bastille. He sets that preference against the hardships he imagines facing on a battlefield, including being unhorsed and without his sword. The remark establishes that Lucien had been held at the prison by the King’s authority; in the moment, even that confinement seems preferable to his current ordeal.

Confinement and Contrast

The Bastille’s significance lies in the reversal Lucien’s complaint expresses: a place of royal detention becomes, by comparison, a refuge from present distress. The contrast sharpens when the King refuses Marie-Josèphe’s request to put Lucien ashore or send him back to Versailles, keeping him aboard and within sight until the treasure is found. Marie-Josèphe understands that Lucien is being held as leverage, just as Yves de la Croix is guarded at the château. The Bastille thus belongs to an earlier instance of Lucien’s restricted freedom, recalled amid a new one imposed by the King.