THE MOVABLE STAIR AT HARVINGTON HALL, BENEATH WHICH IS A ROOM FIVE FEET SQUARE.
TRAP-DOOR IN ROCHESTER HOUSE, SAID TO HAVE BEEN USED BY JAMES II.
If we visit Harvington Hall in Worcestershire at twilight and ascend the massive oak staircase, it will require no great stretch of the imagination to people it with "pursuivants" hunting for their prey; or if we climb to the top landing, to conjure up an indistinct form stealthily removing the floorboard from one of the stairs and creeping beneath it.
This particular step of a short flight running from the landing into the garrets is upon closer inspection indeed movable, and beneath gapes a dark cavity about five feet square, on the floor of which still remains the piece of sedge matting whereon a certain Father Wall reclined a few days prior to his capture and execution in August 1679.
A small concealed aperture in the wainscoting of the "banqueting-room" would admit a straw being thrust from the hiding hole, through which caudles and broths could be sucked up by the unfortunate inmate should his friends be upon the alert.
The house of the loyal Sir Richard Head still exists at Rochester, where King James II. went from Whitehall for the last few days ere he quitted the country. He departed thence secretly. About twelve at night he was rowed to a smack which was waiting without the fort at Sheerness.
HIDING PLACE IN THE GARRET OF UFTON HALL.
There is a secret passage in the upper story communicating with a trap-door to the floor of one of the garrets; this leads by a private staircase to the back of the house. Whether King James found it necessary to make use of the secret passage and trap-door must remain an open question.