The gendarmes had been pursuing three fugitives, and half dead with the long ride and with the drenching rain, they had taken shelter in the inn. The three outlaws were too charitably disposed to disturb them; but one of them, touching the pockets of a sleeping soldier, called out, “This, perhaps, contains the order for our arrest; let us leave the den before the lion roars!” In spite of all the kind offers of those around, they could only procure two horses. The man walked; Ugoni rode one horse, and Scalvini and Arrivabene mounted the other as best they could. The gendarmes slept on. At daybreak the fugitives crossed the heights of the mountain called the Sapei della Briga, where they found some gendarmes quartered; but the good angel who had sent the men at Edolo to sleep, did the same for their comrades, and Arrivabene and his companions passed them unseen. There still remained the most difficult place to pass,--the frontier. They called themselves cattle drivers, going to the fair, and quietly crossed the line of Austrian custom-house officers. The fugitives uncovered their heads, but scarcely had they passed the boundary mark when they fell exhausted to the ground. The effect was indescribable. On one side the officers, blaspheming and threatening, furious at the trick played upon them; and on the other, the poor exiles, leaving country, fortune, friends, and all they held most dear; but blessing Heaven for their safety, and only answering the insults heaped on them by a quiet indifference. The innkeeper of Edolo was imprisoned for a long period; and his poor wife, whom they had told that her husband would be hanged, died suddenly of fear and grief. (_My Prisons._ Silvio Pellico.)
[Illustration: They fell exhausted to the ground.]
_MARRAST, GUINARD, GODEFROI CAVAIGNAC, AND OTHER POLITICAL PRISONERS._
Soon after the riots of April, 1834, at Paris and at Lyons, many men, whose hostile opinions to the Government were well known, were arraigned before the court of peers, and accused of having taken part in those movements. Among those accused were MM. Guinard, Marrast, Godefroi Cavaignac, brother to the great general of that name, Berrier-Fontaine, etc.
The trial went on, but on the night of the 12th July, news was brought that twenty eight of those imprisoned at Sainte Pelagie, formerly the prison for debtors, had managed to escape.