again, where things being set to rights, by the next day at ten
o'clock they sailed with a fair wind, and without any further cross
accident arrived safe at Jamaica. There Tom had the good luck to pick up
a woman with a tolerable fortune, and about three years later remitted
L300 home to the jeweller who had been defrauded of the watch and the
ring, and directed him to pay what was over, after deducting his own
debt, to the people who had trusted him with other things, and who upon
his going off had recovered most of them, and were by this means made a
tolerable satisfaction.

He resided in the West Indies for about five years in all, and in that
time, by his own industry acquired a very handsome fortune of his own,
and therewith returned to Scotland.

I should be very glad if this story would incline some people who have
got money in not such honest ways (though perhaps less dangerous) to
endeavour at extenuating the crimes they have been guilty of, by making
such reparation as in their power, by which at once they atone for their
fault, and regain their lost reputation; but I am afraid this advice may
prove both unsuccessful and unseasonable and therefore shall proceed in
my narrations as the course of these memoirs directs me.

The Life of JOSEPH PICKEN, a Highwayman

There cannot, perhaps, be a greater misfortune to a man than his having
a woman of ill-principles about him, whether as a wife or otherwise.
When they once lay aside principles either of modesty or honesty, women
become commonly the most abandoned; and as their sex renders them
capable of seducing, so their vices tempt them not often to persuade men
to such crimes as otherwise, perhaps, they would never have thought of.
This was the case of the malefactor, the story of whose misfortunes we
are now to relate.

Joseph Picken was the son of a tailor in Clerkenwell, who worked hard at
his employment and took pleasure in nothing but providing for, and
bringing up his family. This unhappy son, Joseph, was his darling, and
nothing grieved him so much upon his death-bed, as the fears of what
might befall the boy, being then an infant of five years old. However,
his mother, though a widow, took so much care of his education, that he
was well enough instructed for the business she designed him, viz., that
of a vintner, to which profession he was bound at a noted tavern near
Billingsgate.

He served his time very faithfully and with great approbatio