man nor you to do it. And," he added, "if ye don't want a hiding, ye'd
better not try."
Up jumped the two chawbacons simultaneously, and rushed at one another
furiously. They rolled on the sanded floor, kicking and cuffing, while the
stranger sipped his gin and water and smoked placidly enough.
Presently, however, one of the combatants opened a clasp-knife, and made
as though he would stab the other. Seeing this, the quiet spectator rose
and seized the man's wrist in a powerful grip. But, quick as thought, his
own wrists were seized, and he was thrown to the floor, both men clinging
tightly to him. When he at length managed to rise, both his wrists were
handcuffed.
"Neatly managed, that!" exclaimed one of the pretended rustics, throwing
off his smock-frock and disclosing the red waistcoat of a Bow Street
Runner.
"You must acknowledge, Captain Hawkes, as how we've done you brown."
They searched their captive, and found two loaded pistols and a great
variety of valuables about him. Then they escorted him to a post-chaise,
which was in waiting; and the same night saw him in Newgate.
He made a quiet and composed end, like most of his kind. They knew their
risks, these dauntless enemies of society, and accepted death by
strangulation when it came with something of philosophy.
XX
And now for the plain, unvarnished narrative of one who travelled these
roads a century ago.
[Sidenote: _A STRANGER IN OUR GATES_]
When that simple-minded German, Pastor Moritz, who visited England towards
the close of last century, grew tired of London, he determined, he says,
to visit Derbyshire; and, making the necessary preparations for his
excursion, set out on June 21, 1782, for Richmond, though why he should
have gone to Richmond _en route_ for Derbyshire is difficult to
understand. He took with him four guineas, some linen, and a book of the
roads, together with a map and a pocket-book, and (for he had his
appreciations) a copy of "Paradise Lost."
Thus equipped, he enjoyed for the first time what he calls the "luxury of
being driven in an English stage," from which expression and our own
people's doleful tales of eighteenth-century travelling in England, we may
infer that the public conveyances of the Pastor's native land were
particularly bad. The English coaches were, according to him, viewing them
with the eye of a foreigner, "quite elegant." This particular one was
lined in the inside, and had two seats large enough to accommodate six
persons; "but it must be owned," he goes on to say, "that when the
carriage was full the company was rather crowded." By which we may gather
that the seats rather discommoded than accommodated.
The only passenger at first was an elderly lady, but presently the coach
was filled with other dames, who appeared to be a little acquainted with
one another, and conversed, as our traveller thought, in a very insipid
and tiresome manner. Fortunately, he had his road-book handy, and so took
refuge in its pages by marking his route.
The coach stopped at Kensington, where a Jew would have taken a seat, but
that luxurious conveyance was full inside, and the Israelite was too proud
to take a place amongst the half-price outsiders on the roof. This
naturally annoyed the travellers, for they thought it preposterous that a
Jew should be ashamed to ride on the outside. They thought he should have
been grateful for being allowed to ride on any side in any way, since he
was but a Jew. In this connection Mr. Moritz takes occasion to observe
that the riding upon the roof of a coach is a curious practice. Persons to
whom it was not convenient to pay full price sat outside, without any
seats, or even a rail. By what means passengers thus fastened themselves
securely on the roofs of those vehicles he knew not, but he constantly saw
numbers seated there, at their ease, and apparently with perfect safety.
On this occasion the outsiders, of whom there were six, made such a noise
and bustle when the insiders alighted, as to almost frighten them, and I
suspect the ladies were rendered horribly nervous by the only other man
who rode inside the coach recounting to them all kinds of stories about
robbers and footpads who had committed many crimes hereabouts. However, as
this entertaining companion insisted, the English robbers were possessed
of a superior honour as compared with the French: the former robbed only;
the latter both robbed and murdered, doubtless on the principle of that
classic proverb which assures us that dead men tell no tales.
[Sidenote: _THE HIERARCHY OF THIEVES_]
"Notwithstanding this," says our traveller, "there are in England another
species of villains, who also murder, and that oftentimes for the merest
trifles, of which they rob the person murdered. These are called footpads,
and are the lowest class of English rogues, amongst whom, in general,
there reigns something like some regard to character.
"The highest order of thieves (!) are the pickpockets or cutpurses, whom
you find everywhere, and sometimes even in the best companies. They are
generally well and handsomely dressed, so that you take them to be persons
of condition; as indeed may sometimes be the case--persons who by
extravagance and excesses have reduced themselves to want, and find
themselves obliged at last to have recourse to pilfering and thieving.
"Next to them come the highwaymen, who rob on horseback, and often, they
say, even with unloaded pistols, they terrify travellers in order to put
themselves in possession of their purses. Among these persons, however,
there are instances of true greatness of soul; there are numberless
instances of their returning a large part of their booty where the party
robbed has appeared to be particularly distressed, and they are seldom
guilty of murder.
"Then comes the third and lowest and worst of all thieves and rogues, the
footpads before mentioned, who are on foot, and often murder in the most
inhuman manner, for the sake of only a few shillings, any unfortunate
people who happen to fall in their way."
The coach arrived, one is glad to say, unharmed at Richmond, despite
forebodings of disaster; but the pirates on board (so to speak) demanded
another shilling of the Pastor, although he had already paid one at
starting.
At Richmond he stayed the night, and in the evening he took a walk out of
the town, to Richmond Hill and the Terrace, where his feelings during the
few enraptured minutes that he stood there seemed impossible for his pen
to describe. One of his first sensations was chagrin and sorrow for the
days wasted in London, and he vented a thousand bitter reproaches on his
irresolution in not quitting that huge dungeon long before, to come here
and spend his time in paradise.
The landlady of the inn was so noted for the copiousness and the loudness
of her talking to the servants that our traveller could not get to sleep
until it was very late; but, notwithstanding this, he was up by three
o'clock the next morning to see the sun rise over Richmond Hill. Alas!
alas! the lazy servants, who cared nothing for such sights, did not arise
till six o'clock, when he rushed out, only to be disappointed at finding
the sky overcast.
And now, having finished his breakfast, he seized his staff, his only
companion, and proceeded to set forth on foot. Unfortunately, however, a
traveller in this wise seemed to be considered as a sort of wild man or
eccentric creature, who was stared at, pitied, suspected, and shunned by
all. There were carriages without number on the road, and they occasioned
a troublesome and disagreeable dust, and when he sat down in a hedge to
read Milton, the people who rode or drove past stared at him with
astonishment, and made significant gestures, as who should say, "This is a
poor devil with a deranged head," so singular did it appear to them that a
man should sit beside the public highway and read books.
[Sidenote: _PILGRIM'S PROGRESS_]
Then, when he again resumed his journey, the coachmen who drove by called
out now and again to ask him if he would not ride on the outside of their
coaches; and the farmers riding past on horseback said, with an air of
pity, "'Tis warm walking, sir;" and, more than all, as he passed through
the villages, every old woman would come to her door and cry pitifully,
"Good God!"
And so he came to Windsor, where, as he entered an inn and desired to have
something to eat, the countenances of the waiters soon gave him to
understand that they thought our pedestrian little, if anything, better
than a beggar. In this contemptuous manner they served him, but, to do
them justice, they allowed him to pay like a gentleman. "Perhaps," says
Pastor Moritz, "this was the first time these pert, be-powdered puppies
had ever been called on to wait on a poor devil who entered the place on
foot." To add to this indignity, they showed him into a bedroom which more
resembled a cell for malefactors than aught else, and when he desired a
better room, told him, with scant ceremony, to go back to Slough. This, by
the way, was at the "Christopher," at Eton. Crossing the bridge into
Windsor again, he found himself opposite the Castle, and at the gates of a
very capital inn, with several officers and persons of distinction going
in and out. Here the landlord received him with civility, but the
chambermaid who conducted him to his room did nothing but mutter and
grumble. After an evening walk he returned, at peace with all men; but the
waiters received him gruffly, and the chambermaid, dropping a
half-curtsey, informed him, with a sneering laugh, that he might go and
look for another bedroom, for the one she had by mistake shown him was
already engaged. He protested so loudly at this that the landlord, who was
a good soul, surely, came, and with great courtesy desired another room to
be shown him, which, however, contained another bed.
Underneath was the tap-room, from which ascended the ribaldries and low
conversation of some objectionable people who were drinking and singing
songs down there, and scarcely had he dropped off to sleep before the
fellow who was to sleep in the other bed came stumbling into the room.
After colliding with the Pastor's bed, he found his own, and got into it
without the tiresome formality of removing boots and clothes.
The next morning the Pastor prepared to depart, needlessly annoyed by that
eternal feminine--the grumbling chambermaid, who informed him that on no
account should he sleep another night there. As he was going away, the
surly waiter placed himself on the stairs, saying, "Pray remember the
waiter," and when in receipt of the three-halfpence which our traveller
bestowed, he cursed that inoffensive German with the heartiest
imprecations. At the door stood the maid, saying, "Pray remember the
chambermaid." "Yes, yes," says the Pastor (a worm will turn), "I shall
long remember your most ill-mannered behaviour," and so gave her nothing.
Through Slough he went, by Salt Hill, to Maidenhead. At Salt Hill, which
could hardly be called a village, he saw a barber's shop. For putting his
hair in order, and for the luxury of a shave, that unconscionable barber
charged one shilling.
Between Salt Hill and Maidenhead, this very much contemned pedestrian met
with a very disagreeable adventure. Hitherto he had scarcely met a single
foot-passenger, whilst coaches without number rolled every moment past
him; for few roads were so crowded as was the Bath Road at this time.
[Sidenote: _THE PASTOR AND THE FOOTPAD_]
In one place the road led along a low, sunken piece of ground, between
high trees, so that one could see but a little way ahead, and just here a
fellow in a brown frock and round hat, with an immense stick in his hand,
came up to him. His countenance was suspicious. He passed, but immediately
turned back and demanded a halfpenny to buy bread, for he had eaten
nothing (so he said) that day.
The Pastor felt in his pocket, but could find nothing less than a
shilling. Very imprudently, I should say, he informed the beggar of that
fact, and begged to be excused.
"God bless my soul!" said the beggar, which pious invocation so frightened
our timid friend that he, having due regard to the big stick and the
brawny hand that held it, gave the beggar a shilling. Meanwhile a coach
came past, and the fellow thanked him and went on his way. If the coach
had come past sooner, he "would not," he says, "so easily have given him
the shilling, which, God knows, I could not well spare. Whether a footpad
or not, I will not pretend to say; but he had every appearance of it."
And so this unfortunate traveller marches off to the Oxford Road, and we
are no longer concerned with him.
XXI
A fine broad gravel stretch of highway is that which, on leaving Salt
Hill, takes us gently down in the direction of the Thames, which the Bath
Road crosses, over Maidenhead Bridge. The distance is four miles, with no
villages, and but few scattered houses, on the way. Two miles and one mile
respectively before the Bridge is reached are the wayside inns, called
"Two Mile Brook" and "One Mile House." Near this last is the beautiful
grouping of roadside elms, sketched in the accompanying illustration, "An
English Road." Half a mile onward, the Great Western Railway crosses the
road by a skew-bridge, and runs into Taplow station. Taplow village lies
quite away from the road, but has an outpost, as it were, in the old, with
the curious sign of the "Dumb Bell." Beyond this, the intervening stretch
of road as far as Maidenhead Bridge is lined with villas standing in
extensive grounds. Here the traveller renews his acquaintance with the
Thames, and passes over a fine stone bridge, built in 1772, from Bucks to
Berks. This bridge succeeded a crazy timber structure, which itself had
several predecessors. It is one of these early bridges that is mentioned
in the declaration of a hermit who obtained a licence to settle here and
collect alms. Such roadside hermits were common in the Middle Ages. They
were licensed by the Bishop of their diocese, and were often useful in
keeping bridges and highways in good order; the alms they received
being, indeed, very much in the nature of voluntary tolls for these
services. On the following declaration, Richard Ludlow obtained his
licence:--
[Sidenote: _AN EARLY TOLL-KEEPER_]
"In the name of God, Amen. I, Richard Ludlow, before God and you my Lord
Bishop of Salisbury, and in presence of all these worshipful men here
being, offer up my profession of hermit under this form: that I, Richard,
will be obedient to Holy Church; that I will lead my life, to my life's
end, in sobriety and chastity; will avoid all open spectacles, taverns,
and other such places; that I will every day hear mass, and say every day
certain Paternosters and Aves: that I will fast every Friday, the vigils
of Pentecost and All Hallows, on bread and water. And the goods that I may
get by free gift of Christian people, or by bequest, or testament, or by
any reasonable and true way, receiving only necessaries to my sustenance,
as in meat, drink, clothing, and fuel, I shall truly, without deceit, lay
out upon reparation and amending of the bridge and of the common way
belonging to ye same town of Maidenhead."
[Illustration: AN ENGLISH ROAD.]
There is, perhaps, no more delightful picture along the whole course of
the Bath Road than the view from Maidenhead Bridge up river, where the
house-boats, gay with flowers and Japanese lanterns, are gathered beside
the trim lawns of the riverside villas, with the gaily dressed crowds by
Boulter's Lock beyond, and the wooded heights of Clieveden closing in the
distance. Maidenhead shows the river at its most fashionable part.
It was at the "Greyhound" Inn, Maidenhead, that the unhappy Charles the
First bade farewell to his children, July 16, 1647. He was in charge of
his Roundhead captors at Caversham, and had been allowed to come over for
two days. The Prince of Wales was abroad, but the Duke of York, then
fifteen years of age; the Princess Elizabeth, two years younger; and the
seven-year-old Duke of Gloucester, were brought to him. The affecting
scene is said to have drawn tears even from Cromwell.
Maidenhead Bridge--the wooden one which preceeded the present
structure--might have been the scene of a desperate encounter, but
happened instead to have witnessed an equally desperate and farcical
devil-take-the-hindmost flight on the part of the Irish soldiers of James
the Second, who were posted here to dispute the passage of the Thames with
the advancing forces of William of Orange.
The November night had shrouded the river and the country side, when the
sound of drums beating a Dutch march was heard. The soldiers, who had no
heart in their work, did not remain to defend that strategic point, and
bolted. They would have discovered, if they had kept their posts, that the
martial music which lent them such agility was produced by the townsfolk
of Maidenhead, who, in spite of that national crisis, appear to have been
merry blades.
XXII
The "Bear" was the principal inn at Maidenhead in the coaching era, and
owed much of its prosperity to the unwillingness of travellers who carried
considerable sums of money with them to cross Maidenhead Thicket at night.
They slept peacefully at the "Bear," and resumed the roads in the morning,
when the highwaymen were in hiding.
[Sidenote: _MAIDENHEAD THICKET_]
Maidenhead Thicket is really a long avenue lining the highway two miles
from that town. It is a beautiful and romantic place, but its beauties
were not apparent to travellers in days of old. The sinister reputation of
the spot goes back for hundreds of years, and may be said to have arisen
from the time of the Dissolution of the Monasteries, when Reading Abbey
was despoiled. To that Abbey had resorted many hundreds of poor, certain
of finding relief at its gates, and when its hospitality had become a
thing of the past, these dependents simply infested the neighbourhood, and
either begged or stole. As a chronicler of that time quaintly said: "There
is great stoare of stout vagabonds and maysterless men (able enough for
labour) which do great hurt in the country by their idle and naughtie
life." In those times the Hundreds were liable for any robberies committed
within their boundaries; and in 1590 the Hundred of Benhurst, in which
Maidenhead Thicket is situated, had actually to pay L255 compensation for
highway robberies committed here. In fact, Maidenhead Thicket had for a
long time an unenviable reputation for highway robberies, with or without
violence, and the desperadoes had so little care whom they robbed that not
even the Vicars of Hurley, who came over to officiate at Maidenhead once a
week, were safe. This was so fully recognized that the Vicars of Hurley
used to draw an annual L50 extra on account of their risks.
In later years a farmer, whose name was Cannon, was stopped one night on
driving from Reading market. Two footpads compelled him to give up the
well-filled money-bag he carried with him, and then let him go, consumed
with impotent rage at his helplessness and the loss of his money.
Suddenly, however, he remembered that he had with him, under the seat of
the gig, a reaping-hook which he had brought back from being mended at
Reading. That recollection brought him a bright idea. Turning his gig
round, he drove back to the spot where he had been robbed, by a back way.
As he had supposed, the ruffians were still there, waiting for more
plunder. In the dark they took the farmer for a new-comer, until he had
got to close quarters with his reaping-hook, which they mistook for a
cutlass. The end of the encounter was that one footpad was left for dead,
and the other took to his heels. The farmer searched the fallen foe and
found his money-bag, together, it was said, with other spoils, which he
promptly annexed, and drove off rejoicing.
[Illustration: MAIDENHEAD THICKET.]
After these tales of derring-do and robustious encounters, the story of
the road becomes comparatively tame as it goes on and passes through
Twyford and Reading.
[Illustration: THE "BELL AND BOTTLE" SIGN.]
[Sidenote: _"BELL AND BOTTLE"_]
At the western end of Maidenhead Thicket, where, lying modestly back from
the road, stands one of the innumerable "Coach and Horses" of the highway,
the gossips of the adjacent Littlewick Green foregather and play bowls on
the grass. Then comes Knowl Hill, where an old sign, swinging romantically
from a wayside fir tree, proclaims the proximity of a curiously named inn,
the "Bell and Bottle." What affinity have bells for bottles, or bottles
for bells? "What," as the poet asks (in quite a different connection), "is
Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba?" But perhaps the original innkeeper was
something of a cynic, and thus paraphrased the well-worn conjunction,
"Beer and Bible." Unfortunately for the inquiring stranger, the origin is
"wrop in mistry."
Down below Knowl Hill, past a chalk quarry on the right, is yet another
inn--the neat and pretty "Seven Stars," to be succeeded at the hamlet of
Kiln Green by the "Horse and Groom," gabled and embowered with vines, and
facing up, not fronting, the road, in quite the ideal fashion. What the
country here lacks in bold scenery it evidently gains in fertility, for
the gardens of Kiln Green are a delightful mass of luxuriant flowers.
The road through Hare Hatch to Twyford is flat and uninteresting. Twyford
itself, an ancient place on the little river Loddon, is losing its antique
character, from being the scene of much building activity. An old
almshouse remains on the right hand, with the inscription, "Domino et
pauperibus, 1640."
The five miles between Twyford and Reading exhibit the gradual degeneracy
of a country road approaching a large town; as regards the scenery, that
is to say. The quality of the road surface remains excellent, and the
width is generous--a circumstance probably owing to the especial widening
carried out so far back as 1255, in consequence of the dangerous state of
the highway, which was then narrow and bordered by dense woods wherein
lurked all manner of evildoers.
Three miles from the town, and continuing for the length of a mile, is a
pleasant avenue of trees. The deep Sonning Cutting on the Great Western
Railway is then crossed, and the suburbs of Biscuit Town presently
encountered.
XXIII
"The run to Reading," I learn from a cycling paper, "constitutes a
pleasant morning's spin from London." I should like to call up one of our
great-grandfathers who travelled these thirty-nine miles painfully by
coach, and read that paragraph to him.
[Sidenote: _BISCUITS, SEEDS, AND SAUCE_]
Reading numbers over 60,000 inhabitants, and is rapidly adding to them.
This prosperity proceeds from several causes, Reading being--
"'Mongst other things, so widely known,
For biscuits, seeds, and sauce."
The town, of course, stands for biscuits in the minds of most people, and
the names of Huntley and Palmer have become household words, somewhat
eclipsing Cock's Reading Sauce, and the seeds of Sutton's; while few
people outside Reading are cognizant of its great engineering industries.
So much for modern Reading, whose principal hero is George Palmer.
[Illustration: PALMER'S STATUE.]