treet door; while the bailiff and his follower,
arriving at the breach, were deterred from entering by the brethren of
my deliverer, who, presenting their shears, like a range of chevaux de
frise, commanded them to retire, on pain of immediate death. And the
catchpole, rather than risk his carcase, consented to discharge the
debt, comforting himself with the hope of making me prisoner again.
There, however, he was disappointed. I kept snug, and laughed at his
escape-warrant, until I was ordered abroad with the regiment, when I
conveyed myself in a hearse to Gravesend, where I embarked for Flanders;
but, being obliged to come over again on the recruiting service, I was
nabbed on another score. And all the satisfaction my first captor has
been able to obtain, is a writ of detainer, which, I believe, will fix
me in this place, until the parliament, in its great goodness, shall
think proper to discharge my debts by a new act of insolvency."

Everybody owned, that the captain's success was equal to the hardiness
of his enterprise, which was altogether in the style of a soldier; but
one of the merchants observed, that he must have been a bailiff of small
experience, who would trust a prisoner of that consequence in such an
unguarded place. "If the captain," said he, "had fallen into the hands
of such a cunning rascal as the fellow that arrested me, he would not
have found it such an easy matter to escape; for the manner in which I
was caught is perhaps the most extraordinary that ever was practised
in these realms. You must know, gentlemen, I suffered such losses by
insuring vessels during the war, that I was obliged to stop payment,
though my expectations were such as encouraged me to manage one
branch of business, without coming to an immediate composition with my
creditors, and, in short, I received consignments from abroad as usual,
that I might not be subject to the visits of those catchpoles, I never
stirred abroad; but, turning my first floor into a warehouse, ordered
all my goods to be hoisted up by a crane fixed to the upper story of my
house. Divers were the stratagems practised by those ingenious ferrets,
with a view of decoying me from the walls of my fortification. I
received innumerable messages from people, who wanted to see me at
certain taverns, upon particular business. I was summoned into the
country, to see my own mother, who was said to be at the point of
death. A gentlewoman, one night, was taken in labou