Protestant Exiles from France/Volume 2 - Book Third - Chapter 27 - Pain
Pain.
Aaron Pain of Dieppe, with his third son, Gabriel, escaped to Rye in Sussex. His wife, Rachel, followed, disguised in sailor’s clothes. They had previously, without suspicion, sent their daughter, Rachel, to Rye to learn English. Their infant, David, only a year old, was brought to the fort of the town gate of Dieppe. The river flowed below it. On the other side a sailor was waiting, by appointment. There was a space below the gate, and the child was passed through to him, and was safely carried over to Rye. The family removed to London, where their name was spelt Paine. In Crosse’s “Historical Tales” (also in “Household Words”) there is a similar anecdote. The scene is the gate of a town at nightfall. A Huguenot husband and wife, who are known to the guard, have the gate opened for them, and are allowed to pass out — any suspicion of their intention to leave France being neutralised by the fact that the mother is not carrying her child. But before knocking at the door of the guard-house they had brought the child, who was sleeping under the influence of an opiate, and laid him in the centre of the well-worn causeway. They had packed him up in a bundle tied with a string, and the long end of the string had been dropped at the hollow space right below the gate. Having been let out themselves, and being locked out, they drew their precious bundle through the opening; and both parents and child had a safe journey to England.