Delaware gazette. [volume] (Delaware, Ohio) 1855-1886, 1870-12-16
JAlL-RIRDs AND THEIR FLIGHrs.
From seFibner's Monthly.l

SALAlOAAB tAAS il4OSl noteworthy and con-
sPicuous personages of the Eighteenth
/ Century, man that might be called a
/ tne bird IT fne feathers make one. was
the SIgnor Giovanni GiacOmo Casanova
| di Seingau1t. In the vivacious memoirs
which he left behind him, he speaks Of
/ himself as "un des plus mauvais suiets
| de Venise, but herein he undeniablv
! hattered himself, for he did not rise to
I the eminence of great criminal, but
was simply a gay, graceless scamp
whom we should sooner entitle a
/ cke1,alie,- a fHaHSIIze. Arrayed in the
richest garments of the picturesque
period and country in which he lived
garments that were never paid for, Cas-
anova went from court to court of
Europe, delighting everybody with his
airy bravado and his graceful insolence.
winning the hearts of the women and
borrowing the money of the men, until
there remained for him no longer A
theatre for the practice of his arts and
the display of his attractions. In
biographical writings he is mentioned as
the Don Juan of his time but the Don
Juan of the dramatic or the lyric stage
was modest and retiring person in
comparison with the Venetian adven-
turer. He went to visit Voltaire at
Ferney, and Frederick the Great at Sans
Souci; he saw. but does not seem to
have fascinated, Catherine the Second at
St. Petersburg, and gained some favor
with Pope Benedict XIV. at Rome; he
met George III. and the Chevalier
d Eon in London, and encountered Gag
hostro at Aix-Cagliostro who, alone Of
all his contemporaries, was altogether as
accomplished and magnificent a charla-
tan and beggar as himself From his
social triumphs in such illustrious com
pany, Casanova came down often to
most ignoble straits, and was forced to
sorry expedients, for so great a man. to
make living. Perhaps the most re-
spectacle position he ever occupied, I'M
til the lettered close of his remarkable
career, was as a member of the orches-
ira, in I745, of the theatre of San
Samuele in Venice. Here he PLAYED for
some time, in one of his intervals of i'm |
pecuniosity, until he could reft his ward |
robe and organize his plans for another
campaign. Such scamps rarely come /
to good end, and yet the last twelve |
years of CasanOVa's life were spent in |
creditable, nay, honorable employment. |
as the librarian of Count Waldstein of |
Bohemia in whose well-stored alcoves |
he wrote the History of Poland and pre- /
pared translation of the IIiad.
Atsdaybreak on the morning of the |
10Th Of July, 1855, when Casanova was |
living as a man of fashion in Venice. |
the Grand Master, acting under the or
ders of the much dreaded Council of
Ten. entered his chamber and bade him
instantly rise, dress himself, gather up
all his manuscripts, and follow where he
the Grand Master, should lead, Upon
questioning his authority and receiving
tor answer that it was on the part of the
frlbunal-a word which almost turned
Casanova into stone-that the arrest was
made, our fine gentleman put on laced
shirt and his best habit, and otherwise
obeyed. They got into a gondola and
were carried to the house of the Grand
Master, from which Casanova was pres
entity conveyed along the Grand Canal
to the quay of the Prisons, where. dis
with the guard, he was made
to enter a building, ascend several
flights of stairs, traverse a gallery, and
cross the Canal, to another building op-
posite, by bridge. 1t was the Bridge
Of Signs.
On his way. Casanova passed through
the very hall of the Council, and ar
irving upon the floor above it, was con
Hned IN small cell communicating with
a great garnet, where, with other prison.
ers, he was allowed at stated times to
walk. 1t was that part of the prison
which was known by the descriptive
and memorable title of Under the
Leads.
1t need hardly be said that with so
fertile mind and irrepressible a spirit
as he possessed. Casanova entertained.
from the very moment of his incarcera-
lion, the idea of escape. Fortune fav-
pred hIn at the start. In wandering
about the old garnet he found an iron
bolt, OF the thickness of an ordinary
and twenty inches in
length, which he sharpened, upon
piece of loose marble from the walls. in
10 a sort of pike. With this he under
took to cut his way through the floor.
which was of three thicknesses. into the
apartment below. 1t was a work of
great difficulty. Fearing that the hole
10 be made under his bed would be dis
covered by the servants when they came
% sweep his cell, he feigned a cough.
and by cut upon the finger stained his
handkerchief with blood to corroborate
ais assertion of hermorrhage produced !
by the dust. In this way he obtained an
exemption from the sweeping of the =,
cells, and went to work with a will. 1t !
vas only at night that he could proceed
without fear of disturbance, and 10 work
It night a lamp was Indispensable
With saucepan, the Lucca oil piyen
aim for his salad, and cotton wicks from 5
he lining of his doublet, he improvised !
lamp. But how to light it /? Casano-
"a was affected at times with an eruption :
iPon his arm, and he brought it into i'm !
Mediate requisition for getting from the
PRISON surgeon some flowers of sulpb,,r :
then, under pretext of wishing a !
'umice-stone for alleviating toothache :
~ rubbing, he prevailed upon the keep