To Mr. Prieur, Sr. [Eldest brother and pharmacist]

February 6, 1818

Dear Sir,

Surprised by the little regard you have for my letters, I find myself writing to you a third time, still in the hope that you will take the trouble to reply  Do not go so far as to deceive me, to persuade me that all the evils I experience exist only in my imagination; that your brother is incapable of doing me the slightest harm; that he is, moreover, more than eighty leagues away from me, and that you are becoming weary of my stories. 

Do you think that I have completely lost my mind? As I told you in my last letter, your brother is here, and if he is not, he has instructed someone to torment me in his stead. Your stubbornness in not answering me leads me to suspect that you are in league with him, something I had not wanted to believe until now.

Mr. Papon Lomini, your cousin, and Arloin, his relative and friend, came to see me, the conversation turned only to the wickedness of your brother, whose behavior was offensive to both of them, knowing the services I had given to Etienne. They promised to see Baptiste, your brother, on this subject, and to urge Etienne to end his persecution of me, or they would put a stop to it. 

I will give you, in another letter, all the details of the harm your brother has made me suffer since October. 

What can I do but take offense at his conduct? He has promised to rescue me from the authority of Mr. Pinel; he himself has witnessed all his cruelties, and those of his infernal company, to the point that he promised to remove me from his power and take me into his own authority, telling me that once I was there, he would set me free. 

I have the honor to be your servant,

M.B.