Returning to the Tower, where she had already been on several occasions, she pretended to be the bearer of good news. On this occasion she only remained long enough to tell Lord Nithsdale the plan she had formed for effecting his deliverance, after which she returned to her lodgings in Drury Lane. There she confided her plan to her landlady, a worthy soul, named Mills, and prevailed upon her to accompany her to the Tower, together with Mrs Morgan, after some arrangement had been made in their costumes, to which “their surprise and astonishment made them consent,” writes Lady Nithsdale, “without thinking of the consequences.” On their way to the fortress Lady Nithsdale entered into the details of her plan. Mrs Morgan was to wear a dress belonging to Mrs Mills over her own clothes, and in this dress Lady Nithsdale would disguise her husband, and so transformed, he could make his way out of the Tower. It was a bold scheme, and was admirably carried out in every detail. On arriving at the Governor’s, now the King’s, House, where Lord Nithsdale was imprisoned, Lady Nithsdale was only allowed to bring one friend in at a time, and first introduced Mrs Morgan, a friend, she said, of her husband, who had come to bid him farewell. Mrs Morgan, when she had come into the prisoner’s room, took off the outer dress she was wearing over her own, and into this Lord Nithsdale was duly introduced. Then Lady Nithsdale asked Mrs Morgan to go out and bring in her maid Evans. “I despatched her safe,” she writes, “and went partly downstairs to meet Mrs Mills, who held her handkerchief to her face, as was natural for a person going to take a last leave of a friend before his execution; and I desired her to do this that my lord might go out in the same manner. Her eyebrows were inclined to be sandy, and as my lord’s were dark and thick, I had prepared some paint to disguise him. I had also got an artificial headdress of the same coloured hair as hers, and rouged his face and cheeks, to conceal his beard which he had not had time to shave. All this provision I had before left in the Tower. The poor guards, whom my slight liberality the day before had endeared me to, let me go out quietly with my company, and were not so strictly on the watch as they usually had been, and the more so, as they were persuaded, from what I had told them the day before, that the prisoners would obtain their pardon. I made Mrs Mills take off her own hood, and put on that which I had brought for her. I then took her by the hand, and led her out of my lord’s chamber; and in passing through the next room, in which were several people, with all the concern imaginable, I said, ‘My dear Mrs Catherine, go in all haste, and send me my waiting-maid; she certainly cannot reflect how late it is. I am to present my petition to-night, and if I let slip this opportunity, I am undone, for to-morrow it is too late. Hasten her as much as possible, for I shall be on thorns till she comes.’ Everybody