you eat, or the
trouble taken about you." Judge, reader, what pangs such insolence,
added to such sufferings must inflict. Judge what were my thoughts,
foreseeing, as I did, an endless duration to this imprisonment and these
torments.

My three doors were kept ever shut, and I was left to such meditations as
such feelings and such hopes might inspire. Daily, about noon, once in
twenty-four hours, my pittance of bread and water was brought. The keys
of all the doors were kept by the governor; the inner door was not
opened, but my bread and water were delivered through an aperture. The
prison doors were opened only once a week, on a Wednesday, when the
governor and town major, my hole having been first cleaned, paid their
visit.

Having remained thus two months, and observed this method was invariable,
I began to execute a project I had formed, of the possibility of which I
was convinced.

Where the night-table and stove stood, the floor was bricked, and this
paving extended to the wall that separated my casemate from the adjoining
one, in which was no prisoner. My window was only guarded by a single
sentinel; I therefore soon found, among those who successively relieved
guard, two kind-hearted fellows, who described to me the situation of my
prison; hence I perceived I might effect my escape, could I but penetrate
into the adjoining casemate, the door of which was not shut. Provided I
had a friend and a boat waiting for me at the Elbe, or could I swim
across that river, the confines of Saxony were but a mile distant.

To describe my plan at length would lead to prolixity, yet I must
enumerate some of its circumstances, as it was remarkably intricate and
of gigantic labour.

I worked through the iron, eighteen inches long, by which the night-table
was fastened, and broke off the clinchings of the nails, but preserved
their heads, that I might put them again in their places, and all might
appear secure to my weekly visitors. This procured me tools to raise up
the brick floor, under which I found earth. My first attempt was to work
a hole through the wall, seven feet thick behind, and concealed by the
night-table. The first layer was of brick. I afterwards came to large
hewn stones. I endeavoured accurately to number and remember the bricks,
both of the flooring and the wall, so that I might replace them and all
might appear safe. This having accomplished, I proceeded.

The day preceding visitation all w