t road, he was never
so much as once in danger of a pursuit. Perhaps he owed his security to
the newer taking any partner in the commission of his villainies to
which he was once inclined, though diverted from it by an accident which
to a less obstinate person might have proved a sufficient warning to
have quitted such exploits for good and all.

Bailey being one day at an alehouse, not far from Moorfields, fell into
the conversation of an Irishman, of a very gay alert temper perfectly
suited to the humour of our knight of the road. They talked together
with mutual satisfaction for about two hours, and then the Stranger
whispered Bailey that if he would step to such a tavern, he would give
part of a bottle and fowl. Thither, accordingly, he walked; his
companion came in soon after; to supper they went and parted about
twelve in high good humour, appointing to meet the next evening but one.
Bailey, the day after, was upon the Barnet Road, following his usual
occupation, when looking by chance over the hedge, he perceived the
person he parted with the night before, slop a chariot with two ladies
in it, and as soon as he had robbed them, ride down a cross lane.
Bailey, hereupon, after taking nine guineas from a nobleman's steward,
whom he met about a quarter of an hour after, returned to his lodgings
at a little blind brandy-shop in Piccadilly, resolving the next day to
make a proposal to his new acquaintance of joining their forces. With
this view he staid at home all day, and went very punctually in the
evening to the place of their appointment; but to his great
mortification the other never came, and Bailey, after waiting some
hours, went away.

As he was going home, he happened to step into an alehouse in Fore
Street, where recollecting that the house in which he had first seen
this person, was not far off, it came into his head that if he went
thither, he might possibly hear some news of him. Accordingly he goes to
the place, where he had hardly called for a mug of drink and a pipe of
tobacco, but the woman saluted him with, _O lack, sir! Don't you
remember a gentleman in red you spoke to here the other day? Yes_,
replied Bailey, _does he live hereabouts? I don't know, says the woman,
where he lives, but he was brought to a surgeon's hard by, about three
hours ago, terribly wounded. My husband is just going to see him._

Though Bailey could not but perceive that there might be danger in his
going thither, yet his c