DURING the long nights I remained at the Stag o' Tyne ere I was thought
Worthy to join the Blacks in their nocturnal adventures, or was, by my
Hardihood and powers of Endurance--poor little mite that I was--adjudged
to be Forest Free, I remained under the charge of Ciceley of the
Cindery, and of the corpulent Tapstress whom the Blacks called Mother
Drum. These two women were very fond of gossiping with me; and
especially did Mother Drum love to converse with me upon her own Career,
which had been of the most Chequered, not to say Amazing nature. I have
already hinted that at one time this Remarkable Woman had professed the
Military Profession, in which she had shone with almost a Manly
Brilliance; and from her various confidences--all delivered to me as
they were in shreds and patches, and imparted at the oddest times and
seasons--I was enabled to shape her (to me) diverting history into
something like the following shape.

"I was born, I think," quoth Mother Drum, "in the year 1660, being that
of his happy Restoration to the throne of these Realms of his late
Sacred Majesty King Charles the Second. My father was a small farmer,
who fed his pigs and tended his potato gardens at the foot of the
Wicklow Mountains, about twelve miles from the famous city of Dublin.
His name was O' something, which it concerns you not to know, youngster,
and he had the misfortune to be a Papist. I say the misfortune; for in
those days, O well-a-day, as in these too, and more's the shame, to be a
Papist meant being a poor, unfortunate creature continually Hunted up
and down, Harassed and Harried far worse than any leathern-skinned Beast
of Venery that the Gentlemen Blacks pursue in Charlwood Chase. He had
suffered much under the iron rule" (these were not exactly Mother Drum's
words, for her language was anything, as a rule, but well chosen; but I
have polished up her style a little,) "of the cruel Usurper, Oliver
Cromwell; that is to say the Redcoated Ironsides of that Bad Man had on
three several occasions burnt his Shelling to the ground, stolen his
Pigs, and grubbed up his potato ground. Once had they ran away with his
wife, (my dear Mother), twice had they half-hanged him to a tree-branch,
and at divers intervals had they tortured him by tying lighted matches
between his fingers. When, however, His Sacred Majesty was happily
restored there were hopes that the poor Romanists would enjoy a little
Comfort and Tranquillity; but these F