Part 3

Halting at a convenient place, and placing himself on the grass, in the same manner as before, he again awaited the carriage, this time with but little money spread on the cloth.

The Archbishop again observed him, and this time really believing him to be a mad gamester, was about to make some remark, when Rumbold suddenly cried out joyfully, throwing the dice, "Six hundred pounds!"

"What!" exclaimed the Archbishop, "losing again?"

"No, by G—d!" returned Rumbold, "won six hundred pounds this time. I'll play this hand out, and then leave off, while I'm well."

"And whom have you won of?"

"Of the same person that I left the six hundred pounds for with you, before dinner."

"And how will you get your winnings, my friend?"

"Of his ambassador, to be sure," said Rumbold, drawing his sword. Thereupon, he advanced to the carriage with pistols and drawn sword, and, searching under the carriage-seat, found his own six hundred guineas, and fourteen hundred besides; with which forty pounds weight avoirdupois of bullion, we are gravely told, he got clear off.

The incident is, without a doubt, one of Smith's own inventions—and not one of the best. It serves to show us how entirely lacking in criticism he thought his public, to set before them, without any criticism of his own, such a tale, in which a highwayman who certainly could in real life have been no fool, to have held his own so long on the road, is made to act like an idiot without any advantage likely to be gained by so doing. We see him, in this preposterous story, taking the trouble to carry six hundred guineas with him and playing the fool needlessly, when he might just as well have gone with empty pockets and searched and robbed the carriage with equal success.

More easily to be credited is his robbing of the Earl of Oxford at Maidenhead Thicket. Rumbold was no exquisite, having, as we have already learnt, been merely a bricklayer's apprentice before he assumed the crape mask, and, mounting a horse and sticking a pair of pistols in his belt, took to the road. He often assumed the appearance of a rough country farmer; but he was, at the same time, always a man of expedient. To say of him that he had ostlers and chambermaids in his pay, to give him information of likely travellers, is but to repeat the practice of every eminent hand in the high-toby craft. On the occasion which led to his great exploit here, he had been lurking for some well-laden travellers, who, luckily for them, took some other route, and he was just on the point of riding moodily off when two horsemen rode up the hill. As they drew near he perceived that they were the Earl of Oxford and a servant. That nobleman knew Rumbold (how the acquaintance had been made we are not told), and so it was necessary for the highwayman to assume some sort of disguise. Here we perceive Rumbold's readiness of resource. He threw his long hair over his face, and, holding it in his teeth, rode up in this extraordinary guise and demanded the Earl's purse, with threats to shoot both if it was not immediately forth-coming.

That nobleman was Aubrey De Vere, twentieth and last Earl, the descendant of the old "fighting Veres" and colonel of the Oxford Blues, a regiment named after him, and not after the city of Oxford. Despite all these things, which might have made for valiance, he surrendered like the veriest woman, and submitted to the indignity of being searched. Rumbold rifled him, and at first found only dice and cards, until, coming to his breeches pockets, he turned out a "nest of goldfinches"; that is to say, a heap of guineas. Saying he would take them home and cage them, Rumbold recommended the Earl to return to his regiment and attend to his duty, giving him eighteenpence as an encouragement.

From these examples, it will readily be seen that Maidenhead Thicket did not obtain its ill repute without due cause.

A number of incredible stories of Rumbold are told, both by Smith and Johnson, who seem to have made up for the little real information we have of his more than twenty years' career by writing absolutely unconvincing fiction around him. He was at last executed at Tyburn in 1689.

"CAPTAIN" JAMES WHITNEY

There is much uncertainty about the parentage and the career of James Whitney. The small quarto tract entitled _The Jacobite Robber_, which professes to give a life of Whitney by one who was acquainted with him, says he was born "in Hertfordshire, of mean, contemptible parentage, about two years after the Restauration of King Charles." Smith

## particularises Stevenage as the place in Hertfordshire, and Johnson,

who copies almost everything in Smith, also adopts Stevenage. Waylen, on the other hand, who wrote a singularly good and well-informed book on the highwaymen of Wiltshire, believed Whitney to have been a son of the Reverend James Whitney, of Donhead St. Andrews, and says the highwayman practised largely on Salisbury Plain.

The majority, believing in the Hertfordshire origin of Whitney, fortify their statements by very full and particular accounts of how he was apprenticed to a butcher at Hitchin. We have here an interpolated story of how he and his master went to Romford to purchase calves (Essex calves were so famous that a native of Essex nowadays is still an "Essex calf"). The owner of one particularly fine calf they greatly desired to purchase required too much for it. He happened to be also the keeper of an alehouse, as well as a stock-raiser. While the butcher and Whitney were refreshing themselves in the house and the butcher was grumbling because he could not buy the calf at what he considered a fair price, Whitney thought of an easier way, and whispered to his master that it would be foolish to give good money for the calf when it could be had for nothing. The butcher and Whitney thereupon exchanged knowing winks, and agreed to steal the calf that very night.

Unhappily for them, a man with a performing bear had in the meanwhile arrived, and the landlord, removing the calf from the stable where it had been placed, installed the bear in its place.

At last, night having fallen, master-butcher and apprentice paid their reckoning and prepared to go. Leaving the house, they loitered about until all was quiet, and then, the two approaching the outhouse where the calf had been, Whitney went in to fetch it. The bear was resting its wearied limbs when Whitney's touch roused it. He was astonished in the dark to feel the calf's hair was so long, and was still more astonished when he felt the animal rear itself up on its hind legs and put its arms lovingly round him. Meanwhile the butcher, wondering what could keep Whitney so long, began softly through the doorway to bid him be quick.

[Illustration: WHITNEY HUGGED BY THE BEAR.]

Whitney cried out that he could not get away, and he believed the devil himself had hold of him.

"If it _is_ the old boy," rejoined his master, with a chuckle, "bring him out. I should like to see what kind of an animal he is."

But Whitney's evident terror and distress soon brought him to the rescue, and the bear was made to release her prey.

Before Whitney had served his full time with the butcher, his master cashiered him for idleness. After some little intervening time he became landlord of a small inn at Cheshunt. He was ever, says the author of _The Jacobite Robber_, a passionate admirer of good eating and drinking, especially at other people's expense. The inn, says our author, was the "Bell" or the "White Bear," he would not be sure which. If the "Bell," it was a sign he should presently make a noise over all England; if the "White Bear," a token that the landlord was of as savage a nature as any wild beast.

As a matter of fact, it appears to have been the "George"; but what significance may be extracted from that I do not know.

The inn did not pay its way on legitimate trading, and the people of Cheshunt wondered how Whitney could keep the pot boiling. Yet they need not have wondered, while they could see and hear, three or four times a week, a knot of roaring gentlemen, who sang, drank, swore, and revelled, the landlord himself joining in, until it seemed as if the place were thronged with old Lucifer and his club-footed emissaries. These guests were, in fact, highwaymen, as any one might have perceived, from their extravagant living and the unseasonable hours they kept.

At first Whitney had no hand in his customers' doings. As the quaint author of the tract already referred to says:

"It seems the conscientious Mr. Whitney, for all he was a well-wisher to the mathematicks and a friend to the tribe, did not at first care to expose his own dear person on the road; not that any one can justly tax him at the same time with cowardice, or want of valour (for had he been as plentifully stock'd with grace as he was with valour, he had never taken that employment upon him); but he prudently considered with himself that at present he ran no Risque of hanging for harbouring such people, and besides made a comfortable penny of them: Whereas, should he trade for himself, and scour the Highways to the Tune of _Dammee, Stand and Deliver_, he must certainly at one time or another make a Pilgrimage to _Tybourn_, and swinging in a Rope he had a Mortal Aversion to, because his Prophetical Grand-Mother had formerly told him it was a dry sort of a death.

"But at last an Old Experienced Brother of the Pad won him over to his Party, for, finding our Inn-keeper to be notably stored with all those ingredients and qualifications that are requisite to fit a Man for such a Vocation, he was resolved to leave no method unattempted till he had made an absolute conquest of him. In order to effect this, he represents to him the meanness and servile condition of his present calling, how he was obliged to stand cap in hand to every pitiful Rascal that came to spend Six-pence in his house; that with all his care and diligence he only got a little poor contemptible Pittance, scarce sufficient to pay his Brewer and Baker, but on the other hand, if he would be adopted into their society, he would find Money come flowing in like a Spring Tide upon him; he would live delicately, eat and drink of the Best, and in short, get more in an hour than now he did by Nicking, and Frothing and wrong Reckonings for a whole Twelve Month together. That, as for the Gallows, a Man of Courage and Bravery ought never to be afraid of it, and, should the worst come to the worst, better Gentleman by far than himself had made a Journey to the other World in their Shoes and Stockings."

Thus admonished, Whitney stripped off the inn-keeper's apron, sold off his inn, and took to the road, where he distinguished himself among the foremost highway gentry of his time. As his biographer is fain to acknowledge, he proved to have "inherited all the Courage, Boldness, and Dexterity of the famous Claude Du Vall and the Golden Farmer, and the rest of his other noble Predecessors of the Pad."

This admiring authority then proceeds to give us an account of Whitney's first action, and tells how "he encountered a Jolly Red-fac'd Son of the Church bravely Mounted, with a large Canonical Rose in his Ecclesiastical Hat and his Gown fluttering in the Wind. He looked as if he had been hung round with Bladders. Him, within two miles of St. Albans, he accosts after this manner, 'Reverend Sir, the Gentlemen of your Coat having, in all conscience, enough preached up the edifying Doctrine of Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance, and now I am fully resolved to try the experiment, whether you Believe your own Doctrine, and whether you are able to Practise it. Therefore, worthy sir, in the name of the above-mentioned Passive Obedience and Non-Resistance, make no opposition, I beseech you, but deliver up the filthy Lucre you carry about you.'

"Now you must know that this rosy-gilled Levite had the wicked sum of six-score and ten guineas clos'd up in the waistband of his breeches, designed as a present to a worthy gentleman that lately helped him to a fat living (for you must not call it Symony for all the world, but christen it by the name of Gratitude, and so forth) but Captain Whitney, who, it seems, did not understand any of these softening distinctions, soon eased him of his Mammon, but not without a great deal of expostulation on the Levite's part, and, what was more barbarous, stript him of his spick-and-span new sacerdotal habit, sent his Horse home before him, to prepare his family, and having bound him to his good behaviour, left him all alone to his contemplations in an adjoining wood."

He then met a poor clergyman in threadbare gown, riding a sorry Rosinante, whose poor ribs in a starved body looked like the bars of a bird-cage. What would the typical outlaw, from the days of Robin Hood, onwards, have done in such a rencounter? Why, he would have given the poor divine the new robe and some money; and this Whitney did; handing him four or five bags of the best, saying: "Here is that will buy you a dozen or so of clean bands!" "Thus," says the biographer, "our brave Captain dispensed charities with one hand and plundered with the other."

One day, patrolling Bagshot Heath, he met a gentleman, and desired his purse and watch.

"Sir," said the gentleman, "'tis well you spoke first, for I was just going to say the same thing to you."

"Why then," quoth Whitney, "are you a gentleman-thief?"

"Yes," replied the stranger, "but I have had very bad success to-day, for I have been riding up and down all this morning, without meeting with any prize."

Whitney, upon hearing this doleful tale, wished him better luck, and took his leave.

That night, Whitney and this strange traveller chanced to stay at the same inn, but Whitney had so changed his dress in the meanwhile, and altered his manner, that he was not recognised. He heard his acquaintance of that morning telling another guest how smartly he had outwitted a highwayman that day, and had saved a hundred pounds by his ready wit; and this revelation of how easily he had been hoodwinked made him determined, if it were at all possible, to take his revenge on the morrow. Meanwhile, he listened to the conversation.

The guest, who had been told of the adventure, replied that he also had a considerable sum upon him, and that he would like, if it were agreeable, to travel next day in company with so ready-witted a traveller.

Accordingly, the next morning they set forth together, and Whitney followed, a quarter of an hour later. He soon overtook them, and then, wheeling suddenly about, demanded their purses.

"We were going to say the same to you, sir," replied the ready-witted one.

"Were you so?" asked our hero; "and are you of my profession, then?"

"Yes," they both chorused.

"If you are," said Whitney, "I suppose you remember the old proverb, 'Two of a trade can never agree'; so you must not expect any favour on that score. But to be plain, gentlemen, the trick will do no longer: I know you very well, and must have your hundred pounds, sir; and your 'considerable sum,' sir," turning to the other; "let it be what it will, or I shall make bold to send a brace of bullets through each of your heads. You, Mr. Highwayman, should have kept your secret a little longer, and not have boasted so soon of having outwitted a thief. There is now nothing for you to do but to deliver or die!"

These terrible words threw them into a sad state of consternation. They were unwilling enough to lose their money, but even more unwilling to forfeit their lives; therefore, of two evils they promptly chose the least, and resigned their wealth.

Whitney then met on Hounslow Heath, one Mr. Hull, a notorious usurer, who lived in the Strand. He could hardly have chosen a wretch more in love with money, and therefore less willing to part with it. When the dreadful words, "Stand and deliver!" were spoken, he trembled like a paralytic and began arguing that he was a very poor man, had a large family of children, and would be utterly ruined if the highwayman were so hard-hearted as to take his money. Besides, it was a most illegal, also dangerous, action, to steal; to say nothing of the moral obliquity of those who did so.

"You dog in a doublet," exclaimed the now angered Whitney, "do you pretend to preach morality to an honester man than yourself. You make a prey of all mankind, and grind to death with eight and ten per cent. This once, however, sir, I shall oblige you to lend me what you have, without bond, consequently without interest: so make no more words."

The usurer thereupon reluctantly produced eighteen guineas, and handed them over with an ill grace, scowling darkly at the highwayman, and telling him he hoped one day to have the pleasure of seeing him riding up Holborn Hill, backwards.

It was a foolish thing to remind a gentleman of the road that he would probably some day be an occupant of the cart, travelling to Tyburn. Whitney had already turned to go when these words fell upon his ear; but he now turned back, thoroughly enraged.

"Now, you old rogue," said he, "let me see what a figure a man makes when he rides backwards, and let me have the pleasure, at least, of beholding you first in that posture."

With that, he pulled Hull off his horse, and then setting him on the animal's back again, face to tail, tied his legs together, and then gave the horse two or three cuts, so that it cantered smartly away and never stopped until Hounslow was reached; where the people, who knew the money-lender well and liked him little, had a hearty laugh at his expense before they untied him.

Whitney always affected to appear generous and noble. Meeting one day with a gentleman named Long, on Newmarket Heath, and having robbed him of a hundred pounds in silver, which he found in the traveller's portmanteau, tied up in a great bag, the gentleman told him he had a great way yet to go, and, as he was unknown upon the road, was likely to suffer great inconvenience and hardship, if he had not at least some small sum. Would he not give him back a trifle, to meet his travelling expenses?

[Illustration: WHITNEY AND THE USURER.]

Whitney opened the bag of silver, and held it out at arm's length towards him, saying: "Here, take what you have occasion for."

Mr. Long then put in his hand, and took out a handful, as much as he could hold; to which Whitney made no sort of objection, but only said, with a laugh: "I thought you would have had more conscience."

Smith tells a long story of how Whitney and his band one day met a well-known preacher, a Mr. Wawen, lecturer at Greenwich Church, and, easing him of his purse, made him preach a sermon on the subject of thieving. A very similar story is told of Sir Gosselin (?Joscelin) Denville and his outlaws, who in the reign of Edward the Second did surprising things all over England, not least among them the waylaying and robbing of a Dominican monk, Bernard Sympson by name, in a wood between Henley-on-Thames and Marlow, and afterwards compelling him to preach a sermon to like effect. Captain Dudley is said to have done the same; and indeed, whether it were the slitting of a weasand ("_couper gorge, par ma foy_," as Pistol might say), the taking of a purse, or the kissing a pretty woman, the highwaymen of old were all-round experts. But that they should have so insatiable a taste for "firstly, secondly, and thirdly, and then finally, dear brethren," I will not believe. Some ancient traditional highway robber once did so much, no doubt, and the freak has been duly fathered on others of later generations: just as the antique jests at the expense of College dons at Oxford and Cambridge are furbished up anew to fit the present age.

The Reverend Mr. Wawen responded as well as he could manage to Whitney's invitation, and, whether it be genuine or a sheer invention of Alexander Smith's, it is certainly ingenious, and much better reading than that said to have been preached by the Dominican monk, some three hundred and fifty years earlier.

"Gentlemen," began the lecturer from Greenwich church, "my text is THEFT; which, not to be divided into sentences or syllables, being but one word, which itself is only a monosyllable, necessity therefore obliges me to divide it into letters, which I find to be these five, T. H. E. F. T., Theft. Now T, my beloved, is Theological; H is Historical; E is Exegetical; F is Figurative; and T is Tropological.

"Now the theological part of my text is in two portions, firstly, in this world, and secondly, in the world to come. In this world, the effects it works are T, tribulation; H, hatred; E, envy; F, fear; and T, torment. For what greater tribulation can befall a man than to be debarred from sweet liberty, by a close confinement in a nasty prison, which must needs be a perfect representation of the Iron Age, since nothing is heard there but the jingling of shackles, bolts, grates, and keys; these last, my beloved, as large as that put up for a weathercock on St. Peter's steeple in Cornhill.

"However, I must own that you highwaymen may be a sort of Christians whilst under this tribulation, because ye are a kind of martyrs, and suffer really for the truth. Again, ye have the hatred of all honest people, as well as the envy of gaolers if you go under their jurisdiction without money in your pockets. I am sure all of your profession are very sensible that a gaoler expects, not only to distil money out of your irregularities, but also to grow fat by your curses; wherefore his ears are stopped to the cries of others, as God's are to his, and good reason too; for, lay the life of a man in one scale, and his fees in the other, he would lose the first to obtain the second.

"Next, ye are always in as much fear of being apprehended as poor tradesmen in debt are of the Serjeant, who goes muffled like a thief too, and always carries the marks of one, for he steals upon a man cowardly, plucks him by the throat, and makes him stand till he fleeces him. Only the thief is more valiant and the honester man of the two.

"And then, when ye are apprehended, nothing but torment ensues; for when ye are once clapt up in gaol, as I have hinted before, you soon come under the hangman's clutches, and he hangs you up, like so many dogs, for using those scaring words, 'Stand and deliver!'