Page:Life and exploits of Jack Sheppard.pdf/12

 as always cheefful and pleasant, turning almost every thing that was said, to jest and banter.

On the 14th of October, the Sessions began at the Old Bailey, and Jack knew that the keepers would; be busily engaged in attending upon the court. The next day about two in the afternoon, one of the men carried the prisoner his dinner, examined his irons, and finding all secure, left him. He had hardly been gone an hour before Jack went to work. The first thing he did was to get off his handcuffs, and then with a crooked nail which he found upon the floor opened the great padlock that fastened his chain to the staples. Next he twisted asunder a small link of the chain betwixt his legs, and drawing up his feet-locks as high as he could, he made them fast with his garters, to prevent their clanking. He then attempted to get up the chimney, but his progress was stopt by an iron bar that went across within side, and having descended, he went to work on the outside and with a piece of his broken chain picked out the mortar, and removed a small stone or two, by which means he got out the iron bar