Harold the hamster's great Christmas adventure

Set in the heart of human-occupied Devonshire Road, it tells the tale of an ingenious young rodent who gives his captors the slip by crawling through nooks, crannies and tunnels for six days in search of freedom.

Owner William Haymaker explained: "Our daughter was playing with him when he skilfully eluded her grip and began a furtive search of all, the nooks and crannies in our home.

"You can't imagine our mutual surprise when after a few minutes of silence we discovered the little rascal had found refuge inside a hole that served as a conduit for our gas pipe.

"Our verbal attempts to lure him out were to no avail and we quickly discovered that he had actually ended up two storeys below in the basement of a shop."

The family spent five days trying to lure Harold to no avail. The hamster retained his stiff upper lip despite MI5 style tactics to lure him with bedding, food and water.

Finally it was time for the Haymakers to call in the professionals at Warburton and Sons.

Mr Haymaker added: "They introduced us to their in-house expert on hamster intelligence.

"He provided us with a small cage device with instructions on its use, along with encouragement and best wishes for a positive results."

The family placed the device in the basement and within twelve hours the temptation became too much to bear for Harold. He relented and his adventure came to an end.

Mr Haymaker added: "The cunning little culprit was apprehended and is now serving out his time in our sitting room."