men, to fight and conquer all
nations and bring them to the
nation of God.'--Epistle of
Skipton General Meeting, 1660._

XXVII. TWO ROBBER STORIES. WEST AND EAST

I

LEONARD FELL AND THE HIGHWAYMAN

In that same memorable summer of 1652 when George Fox first visited
Swarthmoor Hall and 'bewitched' the household there, he also met and
'bewitched' another member of the Fell family. This was one Leonard
Fell, a connection of the Judge, whose home was at Baycliff in the
same county of Lancashire. Thither George Fox came on his travels
shortly after his first visit to Swarthmoor, when only Margaret Fell
and her children were at home, and before his later visit after Judge
Fell's return.

'I went to Becliff,' says the Journal, 'where Leonard Fell was
convinced, and became a minister of the everlasting Gospel. Several
others were convinced there and came into obedience to truth. Here the
people said they could not dispute, and would fain have put some
others to hold talk with me, but I bid them, "Fear the Lord and not in
a light way hold a talk of the Lord's words, but put the things in
practice."'

Leonard Fell did indeed put his new faith 'in practice.' He left his
home and followed his teacher, sharing with him many of the perils and
dangers of his journeys in the Service of Truth. Up and down and
across the length and breadth of England the two men travelled side by
side along the hedgeless English roads. At first as they went along,
Leonard Fell watched George Fox with sharp eyes, in his dealings with
the different people they met on their journeys, in order to discover
how his teacher would 'put into practice' the central truth he
proclaimed: that in every man, however degraded, there remains some
hidden spark of the Divine. But put it in practice George Fox did,
till at length Leonard Fell, too, learned to look for 'that of God
within' every one he met, learned to depend upon finding it, and to be
able to draw it out in his turn.

One day, Leonard was travelling in the 'Service of Truth,' not in
George Fox's company but alone, when, as he crossed a desolate moor on
horseback, he heard the thunderous sound of horses' hoofs coming after
him down the road. Looking round, he beheld a masked and bearded
highwayman, his figure enveloped in a long flowing cloak, rapidly
approaching on a far swifter horse than his own 'Truth's pony.' A
moment later, a pis