The wife of one P., an ivory carver and turner in Dale Street, and part owner of the _Mary Ellen_ privateer, had a curiously made foreign box which had been broken, and which no local workman could mend. The French prisoners were famous as clever and ingenious artisans, and to one of them, Felix Durand, it was handed. He accepted the job, and wanted ample time to do it in. Just as it should have been finished, fifteen prisoners, Durand among them, escaped from the Tower, but, having neither food nor money, and, being ignorant of English and of the localities round Liverpool, all, after wandering about for some time half-starved, either returned or were captured. Says Durand, describing his own part in the affair: ‘I am a Frenchman, fond of liberty and change, and I determined to make my escape. I was acquainted with Mr. P. in Dale Street; I did work for him in the Tower, and he has a niece who is _tout à fait charmante_. She has been a constant ambassadress between us, and has taken charge of my money to deposit with her uncle on my account. She is very engaging, and when I have had conversation with her, I obtained from her the information that on the east side of our prison there were two houses which opened into a short narrow street [perhaps about Johnson Lane or Oriel Chambers]. Mademoiselle is very kind and complacent, and examined the houses and found an easy entrance into one.’ So, choosing a stormy night, the prisoners commenced by loosening the stone work in the east wall, and packing the mortar under their beds. They were safe during the day, but once when a keeper did come round, they put one of their party in bed, curtained the window grating with a blanket, and said that their compatriot was ill and could not bear the light. So the officer passed on. At last the hole was big enough, and one of them crept through. He reported an open yard, that it was raining heavily, and that the night was _affreuse_. They crept out one by one and got into the yard, whence they entered a cellar by the window, traversed a passage or two, and entered the kitchen, where they made a good supper, of bread and beef. While cutting this, one of them let fall a knife, but nobody heard it, and, says Durand, ‘Truly you Englishmen sleep well!’ Finally, as a neighbouring clock struck two, they managed to get past the outer wall, and one man, sent to reconnoitre, reported: ‘not a soul to be seen anywhere, the wind rushing up the main street from the sea.’ They then separated. Durand went straight ahead, ‘passed the Exchange, down a narrow lane [Dale Street] facing it, in which I knew Mademoiselle dwelt, but did not know the house; therefore I pushed on till I came to the foot of a hill. I thought I would turn to the left at first, but went on to take my chance of four cross roads—’ (Old Haymarket, Townsend Lane, now Byron Street, Dale Street, and Shaw’s Brow, now William Brown Street).