To the same effect was a letter addressed by Lord Cochrane to the
Speaker of the House of Commons on the 9th of March. "I respectfully
request," he said therein, "that you will state to the honourable
the House of Commons, that I should immediately and personally
have communicated to them my departure from the custody of Lord
Ellenborough, by whom I have been long most unjustly detained; but I
judged it better to endeavour to conceal my absence, and to defer my
appearance in the House until the public agitation excited by the Corn
Bill should subside. And I have further to request that you will also
communicate to the House that it is my intention, on an early day, to
present myself for the purpose of taking my seat and moving an inquiry
into the conduct of Lord Ellenborough."

On the day of that letter's delivery, the 10th of March--also famous
as the day on which Buonaparte's escape from Elba was published in
England--Lord Cochrane's gaolers discovered that he was no longer
in his prison. Immediately a hue and cry was raised. This notice was
issued: "Escaped from the King's Bench Prison, on Monday the 6th day
of March, instant, Lord Cochrane. He is about five feet eleven inches
in height,[A] thin and narrow-chested, with sandy hair and full eyes,
red whiskers and eyebrows. Whoever will apprehend and secure Lord
Cochrane in any of His Majesty's gaols in the kingdom shall have a
reward of three hundred guineas from William Jones, Marshal of the
King's Bench."

[Footnote A: He was really about six feet two inches in height, and
broad in proportion.]

Great search was made in consequence of that notice, and Lord