poor wretches had a miserable hovel
of an inn to their own part on the western outskirts of the Chase, a
place by the sign of the Hand and Hatchet, where they ate their
rye-bread and drank their sour Clink, when they could muster coppers
enough for a twopenny carouse.

This Proclamation, of which at first we made light, was speedily
followed by a real live Act of Parliament, which is yet, I have been
told, Law, and is known as the "Black Act."[M] The most dreadful
punishments were denounced against us by the Houses of Lords and
Commons, and the Blood Money was doubled. One of the most noted
Thief-takers of that day--almost as great a one as Jonathan Wild--comes
down post, and sets up his Standard at Reading, as though he had been
King William on the banks of the Boyne. With him he brings a mangy Rout
of Constables and Bailiff's Followers, and other kennel-ranging
vagabonds; and now nothing must serve him but to beg of the Commanding
Officer at Windsor (my Lord Treherne) for a loan of two companies of the
Foot Guards, who, nothing loth for field-sport and extra pay, were
placed, with their captain and all--more shame for a Gentleman to mix in
such Hangman's work!--under Mr. Thief-taker's orders. He and his
Bandogs, ay, and his Grenadiers, might have hunted us through Charlwood
Chase until Doomsday but for the treachery of the "Coaleys." 'Twas one
of their number,--named, or rather nicknamed, "the Beau," because he
washed his face on Sunday, and was therefore held to be of the first
fashion,--who earned eighty pounds by revealing the hour when the whole
Gang of Blacks might be pounced upon at the Stag o' Tyne. The infamous
wretch goes to Aylesbury,--for our part of the Chase was in the county
of Bucks,--and my Thief-taking gentleman from Reading meets him--a
pretty couple; and he makes oath before Mr. Justice Cribfee (who should
have set him in the Stocks, or delivered him over to the Beadle for a
vagrant); and after a fine to-do of Sheriff's business and swearing in
of special constables, the end of it was, that a whole Rout of them,
Sheriff, Javelin-men, and Headboroughs and all, with the Grenadiers at
their back, came upon us unawares one moonlight night as we were merrily
supping at the Stag.

'Twas no use showing Fight perhaps, for we were undermanned, some of us
being away on the scent, for we suspected some foul play. The constables
and other clod-hopping Alguazils were all armed to the teeth with Bills
and Blund