of escape. It was never visited, and might be used with safety. But how to get there was a difficult question to solve. And how to hide the fact that men were absent from roll-call was another. The latter difficulty was got over by several expedients. If Lieutenant Jones, for instance, was at work in the tunnel, Captain Smith would answer for him; then, when Smith was pronounced absent, he would step forward and declare that he had answered to his own name. His presence served as sure proof that he had not been absent. Other and still more ingenious methods were at times adopted, and the authorities were completely hoodwinked in this particular.

And now as regards the difficulty of entering the cellar. The cooking-room on the first floor contained, in its thick brick and stone partition, a fireplace, in front of which, partly masking it, three stoves were placed for the cooking operations of the prisoners. The floor of this fireplace was chosen as the initial point of excavation, from which a sloping passage might be made, under the floor of the next room, into the disused cellar.

Captain Hamilton, a stonemason by trade, began the excavation, removing the first brick and stone from the fireplace. It need scarcely be said that this work was done only at night, and with as little noise as possible. By day the opening was carefully closed, the bricks and stones being so ingeniously replaced that no signs of disturbance appeared. Thick as the wall was, a passage was quickly made through it, presenting an easy route to the cellar

below. As for this cellar, it was dark, rarely or never opened, and contained only some old boxes, boards, straw, and the like débris, and an abundance

of rats.

The cellar reached, and the route to it carefully concealed by day alike from the prison authorities and the prisoners not in the secret, the question of the tunnel followed. There were two possible routes. One of these led southward, towards the canal; the other eastward, under a narrow street, on the opposite side of which was a yard and stable, with a high board fence on the street side. The opposite side of the yard faced a warehouse.

A tunnel was commenced towards the canal. But it quickly struck a sewer whose odor was more than the workers could endure. It was abandoned, and a tunnel begun eastward, the most difficult part of it being to make an opening in the thick foundation wall. The hope of liberty, however, will bear man up through the most exhausting labors, and this fatiguing task was at length successfully performed. The remainder of the excavation was through earth, and was easier, though much the reverse of easy.

A few words will tell what was to be done, and how it was accomplished. The tunnel began near the floor of the cellar, eight or nine feet underground. Its length would need to be seventy or eighty feet. Only one man could work in it at a time, and this he had to do while crawling forward with his face downward, and with such tools as pocket-knives, small hatchets, sharp pieces of wood, and a broken fire-shovel. After the opening had made some pro

gress two men could work in it, one digging, the other carrying back the earth, for which work fryingpans were brought into use.

Another point of some little importance was the disposal of the dirt. This was carelessly scattered over the cellar floor, with straw thrown over it, and some of it placed in boxes and barrels. The whole amount was not great, and not likely to be noticed if the officials should happen to enter the cellar, which had not been cleaned for years.

The work here described was begun in the latter part of January, 1864. So diligently was it prosecuted that the tunnel was pronounced finished on the night of February 8. During this period only two or three men could work at once. It was, indeed, frightfully exhausting labor, the confinement of the narrow passage and the difficulty of breathing in its foul air being not the least of the hardships to be endured. Work was prosecuted during part of the period night and day, the absence of a man from roll-call being concealed in various ways, as already mentioned.

The secret had been kept well, but not too well. Some workers had divulged it to their friends. Others of the prisoners had discovered that something was going on, and had been let into the affair on a pledge of secrecy. By the time the tunnel was completed its existence was known to something more than one hundred out of the eleven hundred prisoners. These were all placed on their word of honor to give no hint of the enterprise.

The night of February 8 was signalized by the

opening of the outward end of the tunnel. A passage was dug upwards, and an opening made sufficiently large to permit the worker to take a look outward into the midnight air. What he saw gave him a frightful shock. The distance had been miscalculated; the opening was on the wrong side of the fence; there in full sight was one of the sentinels, pacing his beat with loaded musket.

Here was a situation that needed nerve and alertness. The protruded head was quickly withdrawn, and the earth which had been removed rapidly replaced, it being packed as tightly as possible from below to prevent its falling in. Word of the perilous error was sent back, and as the whisper passed from ear to ear every heart throbbed with a nervous shock. They had barely escaped losing the benefit of their weeks of exhausting labor.

The opening had been at the outward edge of the fence. The tunnel was now run two feet farther, and an opening again made. It was now on the inside of the fence, and in a safe place, for the stable adjoining the yard was disused.

The evening of the 9th was that fixed upon for flight. At a little after nine o'clock the exodus began. Those in the secret made their way to the cooking-room. The fireplace passage was opened, and such was the haste to avail themselves of it that the men almost struggled for precedence. Rules had been made, but no order could be kept. Silence reigned, however. No voice was raised above a whisper; every footstep was made as light as possible. It had been decided that fifty men should leave that

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night, and fifty the next, the prison clerk being deceived at roll-call by an artifice which had been practised more than once before, that of men leaving one end of the line and regaining the other unseen, to answer to the names of others. But the risk of discovery was too great. Every man wanted to be among the first. It proved impossible to restrain the anxious prisoners.

Down into the cellar passed a long line of descending men, dropping to its floor in rapid succession. Around the mouth of the tunnel a dense crowd gathered. But here only one man was allowed to pass at a time, on account of the bad air. The noise made in passing through told those behind how long the tunnel was occupied. The instant the noise ceased another plunged in.

The tunnel was

The passage was no easy one. little more than wide enough to contain a man's body, and progress had to be made by kicking and scrambling forward. Two or three minutes, however, sufficed for the journey, the one who had last emerged helping his companion to the upper air.

Here was a carriage-way fronting southward, and leading into Canal Street, which ran along the Lynchburg Canal. Four guards paced along the south side of the prison within plain view. The risk was great. On emerging from the carriage-way the fugitives would be in full sight of these guards. But the risk must be taken. Watching the street for a moment in which it was comparatively clear, one by

one they passed out and walked deliberately along the canal, in the direction away from the prison, like