ped from the
Temple. Had Licquet been to Paris between these two dates? It seems
probable; for he speaks in a letter of a "pretended absence" which might
well have been real.

The manner of Le Chevalier's escape is strange enough to be described.
By reason of his excited condition, "which threw him into continual
transports, and which had seemed to the concierge of the prison to be
the delirium of fever," he had been lodged, not in the tower itself, but
in a dependence, one of whose walls formed the outer wall of the prison,
and overlooked the exterior courts. He had been ill for several days,
and being subject to profuse sweats had asked to have his sheets changed
frequently, and so was given several pairs at a time. On December 13th,
at eight in the morning, the keeper especially attached to his person
(Savard) had gone in to arrange the little dressing-room next to Le
Chevalier's chamber. Returning at one o'clock to serve dinner, he found
the prisoner reading; at six in the evening another keeper (Carabeuf),
bringing in a light, saw him stretched on his bed. The next day on going
into his room in the morning, they found that he had fled.

Le Chevalier had made in the wall of his dressing-room, which was two
yards thick, a hole large enough to slip through. They saw that he had
done it with no other tool than a fork; two bits of log, cut like
wedges, had served to dislodge and pull out the stones. The operation
had been so cleverly managed, all the rubbish having been carefully
taken from within, that no trace of demolition appeared on the outside.
The prisoner (Vandricourt) who was immediately below had not noticed any
unwonted noise, although he did not go to bed till eleven o'clock. Le
Chevalier, whose cell was sixteen feet above the level of the court, had
also been obliged to construct a rope to descend by; he had plaited it
with long strips cut from a pair of nankeen breeches and the cover of
his mattress. Having got into the courtyard during the night by this
means, he had to wait till the early morning when bread was brought in
for the prisoners. The concierge of the Temple was in the habit of going
back to bed after having admitted the baker, and the gate remained open
for "a quarter of an hour and longer, while bread was being delivered at
the wickets."

People certainly escaped from the Temple as much as from any other
prison. The history of the old tower records many instances of men
rescued by their fr