uainted
with these particulars, and instead of being more circumspect in my
behaviour, I affected a ridiculous bravado. It might have been said
that I ought to have had a portion of the premium promised for my
apprehension. I was certainly hotly pursued, as may be judged from
the following incident:--

Jacquard learnt one day that I was going to dine in Rue Notre-Dame. He
immediately went with four assistants, whom he left on the ground-floor,
and ascended the staircase to the room where I was about to sit down to
table with two females. A recruiting sergeant, who was to have made the
fourth, had not yet arrived. I recognised Jacquard, who never having
seen me, had not the same advantage, and besides my disguise would have
bid defiance to any description of my person. Without being at all
uneasy, I approached, and with a most natural tone I begged him to pass
into a closet, the glass door of which looked on the banquetroom. "It
is Vidocq whom you are looking for," said I; "if you will wait for ten
minutes you will see him. There is his cover, he cannot be long. When he
enters, I will make you a sign; but if you are alone, I doubt if you can
seize him, as he is armed, and resolved to defend himself."--"I have my
gendarmes on the staircase," answered he, "and if he escapes--"--"Take
care how you place them then," said I with affected haste. "If Vidocq
should see them he would mistrust some plot, and then farewell to the
bird."--"But where shall I place them?"--"Oh, why in this closet--mind,
no noise, that would spoil all; and I have more desire than yourself
that he should not suspect anything." My commissary was now shut up in
four walls with his agents. The door, which was very strong, closed
with a double lock. Then, certain of time for escape, I cried to my
prisoners, "You are looking for Vidocq--well, it is he who has caged
you; farewell." And away I went like a dart, leaving the party shouting
for help, and making desperate efforts to escape from the unlucky
closet.

Two escapes of the same sort I effected, but at last I was arrested and
carried back to St. Peter's Tower, where, for greater security, I was
placed in a dungeon with a man named Calendrin, who was also thus
punished for two attempts at escape. Calendrin, who had known me during
my first confinement in the prison, imparted to me a fresh plan of
escape, which he had devised by means of a hole worked in the wall of
the dungeon of the galley-slaves, with