Possibly the ancient _camaraderie_ of the Scots and French nations may have had something to do with this pleasant condition of things, for in 1797 Dutch prisoners confined in the Castle complained about ill treatment and the lack of clothing, and the authorities consented to their being removed to ‘a more airy and comfortable situation at Fountainbridge’. In 1799 the Rev. Mr. FitzSimmons, of the Episcopal Chapel, an Englishman, was arraigned before the High Court of Justiciary for aiding in the escape of four French prisoners from the Castle, by concealing them in his house, and taking them to a Newhaven fishing boat belonging to one Neil Drysdale, which carried them to the Isle of Inchkeith, whence they escaped to France. Two of them had sawn through the dungeon bars with a sword-blade which they had contrived to smuggle in. The other two were parole prisoners. He was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment in the Tolbooth. A French prisoner in 1799, having learned at what hour the dung which had been collected in the prison would be thrown over the wall, got himself put into the hand-barrow used for its conveyance, was covered over with litter, and was thrown down several feet; but, being discovered by the sentinels in his fall, they presented their pieces while he was endeavouring to conceal himself. The poor bruised and affrighted fellow supplicated for mercy, and waited on his knees until his jailers came up to take him back to prison. In 1811 forty-nine prisoners contrived to get out of the Castle at one time. They cut a hole through the bottom of the parapet wall at the south-west corner, below the ‘Devil’s Elbow,’ and let themselves down by a rope which they had been smuggling in by small sections for weeks previously. One man lost his hold, and fell, and was mortally injured. Five were retaken the next day, and fourteen got away along the Glasgow road. Some were retaken later near Linlithgow in the Polmount plantations, exhausted with hunger. They had planned to get to Grangemouth, where they hoped to get on board a smuggler. They confessed that the plot was of long planning. Later still, six more were recaptured. They had made for Cramond, where they had stolen a boat, sailed up the Firth, and landed near Hopetoun House, intending to go to Port Glasgow by land. These poor fellows said that they had lived for three days on raw turnips. Not one of the forty-nine got away. I now come to the science of forgery as practised by the foreign prisoners of war in Scotland, and I shall be entirely dependent upon Mr. Macbeth Forbes for my information. The Edinburgh prisoners were busy at this work between 1811 and the year of their departure, 1814.