Balbi must now be fetched, and Casanova crept back to him to be received with fierce reproaches at his supposed desertion. “I made sure you had fallen over,” said the ill-conditioned monk, “and was wondering what would become of me. I meant to go back to the prison as soon as it was quite light. What have you been doing all this time?” Casanova told him to follow and he would see. When arrived at the skylight, Balbi begged to be lowered into the room first, leaving Casanova to get down as best he could, caring nothing whether or not he broke a limb. To descend unaided seemed impossible, but casting about Casanova found a small cupola under repair and near it a ladder to which he attached his rope and prepared to descend; but in mortal terror that the ladder when released would fall into the canal and make a splash, he climbed down to the gutter, and at imminent risk of his life, forced up one end of the ladder under the skylight till it stuck fast for a moment and ultimately dropped into the garret where its end was received by Balbi. Casanova now found himself with his companion in a garret-loft some thirty paces long by twenty broad. After a hurried inspection of the premises and running up against a couple of closed doors, further descent seemed hopeless, and now a sense of overpowering fatigue took possession of Casanova. He could not move hand or foot, but threw himself down on the floor with one of his bundles under his head and succumbed to sleep. The surrender was perfectly irresistible; had death been the penalty of giving way, he could not have kept awake, and the feeling of going off was delicious. He slept for three hours and a half, at the end of which Balbi indignantly shook him again into life to find his brain perfectly clear and his vigour completely restored. It was now about five o’clock in the morning. A glance around showed that this loft formed no part of the prison. There must be some way out. By forcing the lock of the door, they found their way into another chamber and passed through a gallery, that of the archives, down a little stone staircase, and entered a great hall which Casanova recognised as that of the grandducal chancery. It was not easy to get out of this chancery; the locks would not yield, so an attack had to be made on one of the panels of the door. This occupied half an hour, and Casanova, after pushing his friend to the far side, forced his own way through, despite the jagged edges of the broken wooden panel, which punished him cruelly. With clothes torn to rags and blood streaming from numerous wounds on his hips and sides, he hurried on to find a fresh obstacle in a massive door which nothing less than artillery could beat down. Casanova was in despair and ready to throw up the sponge. “I’ve done my share. I leave the rest to Providence,” he said resignedly. “We must wait till help comes.” Meanwhile he bound up his wounds, staunched the blood and changed his clothes.