s and
Tories took the author literally. Defoe was tried, found guilty of
seditious libel, and sentenced to be fined, to stand three days in the
pillory, and to be imprisoned. Hardly had the sentence been pronounced when
Defoe wrote his "Hymn to the Pillory,"--

Hail hieroglyphic state machine,
Contrived to punish fancy in,--

a set of doggerel verses ridiculing his prosecutors, which Defoe, with a
keen eye for advertising, scattered all over London. Crowds flocked to
cheer him in the pillory; and seeing that Defoe was making popularity out
of persecution, his enemies bundled him off to Newgate prison. He turned
this experience also to account by publishing a popular newspaper, and by
getting acquainted with rogues, pirates, smugglers, and miscellaneous
outcasts, each one with a "good story" to be used later. After his release
from prison, in 1704, he turned his knowledge of criminals to further
account, and entered the government employ as a kind of spy or secret-
service agent. His prison experience, and the further knowledge of
criminals gained in over twenty years as a spy, accounts for his numerous
stories of thieves and pirates, _Jonathan Wild_ and _Captain Avery_, and
also for his later novels, which deal almost exclusively with villains and
outcasts.

When Defoe was nearly sixty years of age he turned to fiction and wrote the
great work by which he is remembered. _Robinson Crusoe_ was an instant
success, and the author became famous all over Europe. Other stories
followed rapidly, and Defoe earned money enough to retire to Newington and
live in comfort; but not idly, for his activity in producing fiction is
rivaled only by that of Walter Scott. Thus, in 1720 appeared _Captain
Singleton, Duncan Campbell_, and _Memoirs of a Cavalier_; in 1722, _Colonel
Jack, Moll Flanders_, and the amazingly realistic _Journal of the Plague
Year_. So the list grows with astonishing rapidity, ending with the
_History of the Devil_ in 1726.

In the latter year Defoe's secret connection with the government became
known, and a great howl of indignation rose against him in the public
print, destroying in an hour the popularity which he had gained by a
lifetime of intrigue and labor. He fled from his home to London, where he
died obscurely, in 1731, while hiding from real or imaginary enemies.

WORKS OF DEFOE. At the head of the list stands _Robinson Crusoe_ (1719-
1720), one of the few books in any literature which has held