by Ruskin Bond
Ruskin Bond brings to the comfort and safety of your armchair a collection of inspiring and hair-raising stories of courage and wits, from dangerous and exotic locales all over the world.
The stories in this collection are mostly non-fictional, first-person accounts, all the more gripping for their direct narrative style and terse description. We travel through different yet equally exciting periods in history, from Casanova's gaol, to the erstwhile French colonies in North Africa; from the horrific battlefields of the First World War, to Malekula in the South Pacific. Besides being compelling accounts of 'famous escapes', this anthology provides a peek into fascinating histories, geographies and cultures, and urges you to be, as Ruskin Bond says,'a global traveller'.
Ruskin Bond, well-known as one of India's best-loved and most prolific writers, has been writing novels, poetry, essays and short stories for almost half a century now. Apart from this, over the years he has expertly compiled and edited a number of anthologies, For his outstanding literary contribution, he was awarded the John Llewellyn Rhys Memorial Prize in 1957, the Sahitya Akademi award in 1992 (for English writing in India) and the Padma Shri in 1999.
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THE RUPA BOOK
OF
GREAT ESCAPES
By the same author:
Angry River
A Little Night Music
A Long Walk for Bina
Hanuman to the Rescue
Ghost Stories from the Raj
Strange Men, Strange Places
The India I Love
Tales and Legends from India
The Blue Umbrella
Ruskin Bond's Children's Omnibus
The Ruskin Bond Omnibus-I
The Ruskin Bond Omnibus-II
The Ruskin Bond Omnibus-III
Rupa Book of Great Animal Stories
The Rupa Book of True Tales of Mystery and Adventure
The Rupa Book of Ruskin Bond's Himalayan Tales
The Rupa Book of Great Suspense Stories
The Rupa Laughter Omnibus
The Rupa Book of Scary Stories
The Rupa Book of Haunted Houses
The Rupa Book of Travellers' Tales
The Rupa Book of Great Crime Stories
The Rupa Book of Nightmare Tales
The Rupa Book of Shikar Stories
The Rupa Book of Love Stories
The Rupa Book of Wicked Stories
The Rupa Book of Heartwarming Stories
The Rupa Book of Thrills and Spills
Selection and Introduction Copyright © Ruskin Bond 2005
First Published 2005
This edition 2010
Second Impression 2011
Published by
Rupa Publications India Pvt. Ltd.
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CONTENTS
Introduction
Casanova's Escape from Venice
Based on his Memoirs
The Girl They Couldn't Hang
H. Maxwell
When the Dam Burst
Ernest Bernard Tatnell
The Great Retreat
Aubrey Wade
Escape from the Foreign Legion
Michael Donovan
Escapes of a Stunt Reporter
J. Murray Smith
Escape from a Sunken Submarine
T.C. Bridges and H. Hessell Tiltman
Escape from an Ice Floe
F.A. Beaumont
Trapped by Wild Boar
Ross Salmon
A Woman among Cannibals
Osa Johnson
INTRODUCTION
e all need a little excitement in our lives, but not too much of it! Dangerous life-threatening situations can put a strain on our nerves and hearts. Excitement at second hand is more acceptable, and the best way to enjoy these stories is to relax in an easy chair and feel at peace with the world in the realization that you have nothing to fear or escape from. For it is only when we feel safe and unthreatened that we can enjoy reading about the perils and tribulations of those whose lives and freedoms are in jeopardy.
A good escape story is best told simply and honestly, without too many literary frills. It is best told by the participant himself, who may not be a professional writer. When something extraordinary happens to someone ordinary, it usually makes for a good story. The reader can identify with the narrator and through him with the experience. A true story of terror or suspense can take the reader out of his humdrum daily existence and make him a participant in a struggle for survival. For survival is what these stories are all about. Survival brought about through fortitude, courage, ingenuity—and sometimes plain Chance.
Chance, or a lucky break, always plays a part in our lives. Casanova was a great believes in the goddess Chance. (In India we call her Lakshmi, Goddess of fortune.) But he did not leave everything to Chance, as you will discover when you read this account of his escape from the Inquisition's horrendous jail. He took his chances. And elsewhere in his Memoirs he makes this observation:
I have always believed that when a man gets it into his head to do something, and when he exclusively occupies himself in that design, he must succeed whatever the difficulties. That man will become Grand Vizier or Pope. He will upset a dynasty, provided he starts young and has the brain and perseverance necessary. But when a man has arrived at an age Chance despises he can no longer do anything; for without her aid there is no hope.
Casanova was a bit of a scamp, who loved women and the good things of life, and hated hypocrisy. The church hated dissent, loved hypocrisy, and lost no time in locking him up. But through ingenuity, presence of mind, and good fortune, he made a memorable escape.
Others whose stories are told in this book found themselves in dire circumstances due to the fortunes of war. The great retreat, during World War I, provides an epic of survival. Courage and tenacity were needed in order to escape from the French Foreign Legion. And the heroics of the Russian airmen who rescued the passengers and crew of a ship crushed by Arctic ice equal any epic of human courage and endeavour.
Courage is the common factor in all these stories. Courage and the will to survive, to surmount disaster, to stay free, to live. Love of life is ever present.
Our stories are not confined to a single continent. Here are true tales of human ingenuity, endurance and resourcefulness from Russia and the Arctic, to South America, North Africa, and the China Seas.
Be a global traveller and join in these great escapes.
Ruskin Bond
May, 2005
CASANOVA'S ESCAPE FROM VENICE
Based on his Memoirs
asanova, whose Christian name was John James, and who thought proper to add 'de Seingalt' to his surname, was by birth a Venetian, but claimed to be descended from the ancient Spanish house of Palafox. Talent seems to have been
largely bestowed upon his family; his two younger brothers, Francis and John Baptist, attained a high reputation as painters, and the latter is also known as a writer upon pictorial art. John James was born at Venice in 1725; studied at Padua, and distinguished himself by his precocious abilities, and his rapid progress in learning. His wit and conversational powers made him a favourite guest among the patricians of his native city. He was trained for the Church, and had the prospect of rising in it, but his dissipated habits and social intrigues marred his fortunes, and even brought imprisonment upon him.
After a variety of adventures, he embarked in 1743 tor Constantinople, where he formed an acquaintance with the celebrated Count Bonneval. A quarrel at Corfu compelled him to return to Venice. There for a while he gained subsistence as a violin player. By a lucky chance he acquired the friendship of a rich and powerful Venetian. He happened to be present one day when the senator Bragadino was struck by a fit. Casanova boldly prohibited the use of the medicine which the physicians had prescribed, and by his own skill succeeded in recovering the patient. The grateful Bragadino took him into his house, and thenceforth seems to have almost considered him as a son. But the unsteadiness of Casanova stood in the way of his permanent happiness. He was again under the necessity of quitting his native place, and successively other cities which he visited; and he spent some years in wandering over Italy and visiting Paris, devoting his time chiefly to pleasure and to gaming.
Again Casanova found his way back to Venice, where his converse and social powers procured for him a hearty welcome. But he did not long remain in safety. The malice of an enemy, aided by his own culpable imprudence, at length brought him under the severe lash of the Venetian government. His dissolute character undoubtedly justified suspicion. He confesses with shameless candour that he was anything but pious, and that there was not a more determined libertine in Venice. It was, however, no love of morality that prompted the proceedings against him. Among the many individuals whom he had offended by his tongue, his pen, and his ribaldry, there happened to be one of the state inquisitors, and that worthy personage availed himself of his office to take vengeance on the offender. Convenient witnesses were not difficult to be found in Venice. Three men came forward as Casanova's accusers, and in their depositions they mingled a small portion of truth with much absurd falsehood. They swore that he ate meat on the prohibited days, and that he went to mass only to hear the music—two charges which no doubt were true. Their inventions, however, were more formidable than their facts. They swore vehemently that he was suspected of freemasonry; that the large sums lost by him in gaming, he obtained by selling to foreign ambassadors the state secrets, which he artfully wormed out of his patrician friends, and that he believed only in the devil, in proof of which last accusation they urged, that when he lost his money at play, he never, as all good Christians did, gave way to execrations against his Satanic majesty. His addiction to magical and cabalistical studies was also adduced as evidence of his heretical guilt.
On the morning of the 25th of July 1755 the head of the Venetian police entered the chamber of Casanova, roused him from sleep, demanded his books and papers, and bade the astonished man rise and follow him. When he was told he has arrested by order of the tribunal of the state inquisition, he acknowledges that, on hearing that formidable and terrible name, he was overpowered, and that his wonted courage gave place to the most implicit obedience. Whilst the officer was securing the manuscripts and books, Casanova had his hair dressed, and put on a silken suit, as though he had been going to a ball instead of a prison. The papers and volumes—among the latter of which were his cabalistic books—being collected, he quitted the chamber with the head of the police, and was surprise to find that more than thirty policemen were in waiting.
'Is it not,' he sarcastically observes, 'extraordinary, that in England, where courage is innate, one man is considered sufficient to arrest another, while in my country, where cowardice has set up her home, thirty are required for the purpose? Probably a coward is still more one when he attacks than when he is attacked, and that makes the person assaulted bolder. The truth is, in Venice one man is often seen opposing twenty sbirri: he gives them a good beating, and escapes.'
Four only of the officers were retained by the chief, who proceeded in a gondola to his dwelling with the prisoner, and locked him up in a room, where he remained four hours. On his return, he informed Casanova that he was directed to convey him to the Camerotti—cells which are known also by the name of I Plombi or The Leads, from their being immediately under the leaden roof of the state prison. This prison was opposite to the ducal palace, on the canal called Rio di Palazzo, and was connected with it by a covered bridge, which was emphatically denominated the Bridge of Sighs.
On reaching his destination, Casanova was presented to the secretary of the inquisitors, who merely cast a glance on him, and said, 'It is he; secure him well. 'He was then led up into a dirty garret, about six yards long and two broad, lighted through a hole in the roof! He supposed that he was to be confined there; but he was not to be so leniently dealt with. The jailor applied a large key to a strong, iron-bound door about three feet and a half high, in the centre of which was a grated hole eight inches square. While the jailor was doing this, the prisoner's attention was engaged upon a singular machine, made of iron, which was fixed in the wall. Its use was explained to him in a tone of levity accompanied by laughter, as though there had been some excellent joke in the matter. It was an instrument, similar to the Spanish garotte, for strangling those who were condemned by the cruel inquisitors. After having received this consolatory explanation, he was ushered into his cell, which he could not enter without stooping till he was nearly bent double. The door was closed on him, and he was asked through the grating what he would have to eat. The sudden calamity which had befallen him had deadened his appetite and soured his temper, and he sullenly replied that he had not yet thought about what he would have. The question was not repeated; he was left alone, listened to the keeper locking door after door, and then leaned against the grating in confused and gloomy meditation.
When he was a little recovered from the first shock, Casanova began to explore his dungeon. It was so low that he was obliged to stoop as he groped along, and there was neither bed, chair, nor table in it. There was nothing but a shelf, on which he deposited the silk mantle, hat, plume, and other finery in which he had so unseasonably arrayed himself. The place was involved in all but utter darkness. There was indeed a window, or rather aperture, of two feet square, but it was ingeniously contrived to admit the smallest possible quantity of light. Not only was it thickly checkered by broad iron bars, but immediately above it was a beam of eighteen inches in diameter, which crossed before the opening in the roof.
The heat now became so intolerable, that it drove him to the grating in the door, where he could also rest by leaning on his elbows. From this loop-hole he could see droves of rats— to his imagination as large as rabbits—running about the garret, and even coming up close to the grating. The sight made him shudder, for rats were his aversion, and he hastily shut the wicket. Hour after hour passed away, and no one came near him. He began to feel the misery of solitude, and though he had no desire for food, he was pained by the neglect which left him without it. As the day advanced, his passions rose almost to madness; he howled, stamped, cursed, and screamed for more than an hour. No notice whatever was taken of him; and at length, it being pitch-dark, he tied a handkerchief round his head, and stretched himself on the floor. There he lay for some time, his mind distracted with contending thoughts and emotions, till sleep brought him a welcome relief.
He had slept for three hours, when he was aroused by the midnight bell. Stretching out his hand for a handkerchief, it met another, which was of icy stiffness and coldness. His hair stood on end, all his faculties were palsied by fear, and for some minutes he was unable to move. Recovering himself a little, he thought that his imagination might have deceived him. He extended his hand once mo
re, and still the frozen hand was there. The idea now occurred to him, that a corpse had been placed by his side while he slept! A third time he stretched out his hand to ascertain whether his conjecture was right, and in doing this he moved his left arm, and discovered that he had been terrified by his own hand, which was rendered cold and rigid by his having lain on it for some hours. In itself the discovery was laughable enough; but instead of enlivening him, it rather suggested the gloomiest reflections. He saw himself in a place where, if what was false seemed true, truth itself became a dream, where reason lost half her powers, and where the fancy fell a prey to delusive hopes or fearful despondencies. He began to be distrustful of the reality of everything which presented itself to his senses or his mind.
With the return of day hope revived in the breast of Casanova. He anticipated his immediate liberation; and with a spirit which proved that he was scarcely worthy of freedom, lay meditating terrible schemes of revenge. His cogitations were interrupted by the coming of the jailer who sneeringly asked him whether he had time enough to decide upon what he should eat. This time, seemingly out of bravado, he ordered an ample supply of different articles of food. In a short time the jailer came again, and expressed his wonder that his prisoner had not asked for a bed and some furniture: 'for,' said he, 'if you imagine that you will be here only one night, you are much mistaken!' He the handed a pencil and paper to Casanova, who gave him a list of what he should want. The jailer on its being read to him, declared that books, ink, paper, looking-glass, and razors must be omitted, as they were forbidden things. He required money for the provisions and Casanova gave him one of three sequins, which was all his present wealth. At noon the furniture and the food were brought, and he was desired to mention what he would have for the morrow, as the keeper could visit him only once a day. He was informed, likewise, that the secretary would send him books more fitting than those in the list, as the latter belonged to the prohibited class.