endeavoured by every means to escape from his harsh fate, and for a time acting under the advice of friends, he secreted himself in the neighbourhood of Ferrara. But this was of little avail. The French military tribunal ordered his father and younger brother to be seized as a punishment to the family, and they were thrown into prison, and their property confiscated; steps which compelled Finati to declare himself, and thus saved them from ruin. He was then sent to Milan to be trained and exercised, and in 1806 was despatched with the army to the Tyrol. Here his disgust for the military life again tempted him to seek an opportunity to desert, which he at length accomplished. By day it was impossible to show himself in his uniform without being detected; but all his nights were passed in traversing the deep wilds and forests of that country, until at last he found himself again within his native state. The thought of being now once more near his native home affected him so strongly that he determined to risk the danger of discovery, and to visit his parents in the night. The probable consequences of detection after a second desertion were so serious that he dared not remain in their house, but was compelled to conceal himself in places the least frequented of the country round; sometimes lying in the sheepfolds and outhouses with the animals and cattle, and sometimes in ditches and holes in the earth, so that a life of wretchedness and privation was all that he gained by his escape.
Meanwhile the news of his desertion had reached Ferrara, and the unhappy Finati had the misery of knowing that his persecutors had again begun to wreak their vengeance on his family. The confiscation of their
