Ready-Money Jack maintained his ground and his hold of the
prisoner, and was surrounded by the tailor, the schoolmaster, and
several other dignitaries of the village, and by the clamorous brood
of gipsies, who were neither to be silenced nor intimidated.

By this time the whole household were brought to the doors and
windows, and the Squire to the portal. An audience was demanded by
Ready-Money Jack, who had detected the prisoner in the very act of
sheep-stealing on his domains, and had borne him off to be examined
before the Squire, who is in the commission of the peace.

A kind of tribunal was immediately held in the servants' hall, a large
chamber, with a stone floor, and a long table in the centre, at one
end of which, just under an enormous clock, was placed the Squire's
chair of justice, while Master Simon took his place at the table as
clerk of the court. An attempt had been made by old Christy to keep
out the gipsy gang, but in vain, and they, with the village worthies,
and the household, half filled the hall. The old housekeeper and the
butler were in a panic at this dangerous irruption. They hurried away
all the valuable things and portable articles that were at hand, and
even kept a dragon watch on the gipsies, lest they should carry off
the house clock, or the deal table.

Old Christy, and his faithful coadjutor the gamekeeper, acted as
constables to guard the prisoner, triumphing in having at last got
this terrible offender in their clutches. Indeed, I am inclined to
think the old man bore some peevish recollection of having been
handled rather roughly by the gipsy, in the chance-medley affair of
May-day.

Silence was now commanded by Master Simon; but it was difficult to be
enforced, in such a motley assemblage. There was a continual snarling
and yelping of dogs, and, as fast as it was quelled in one corner, it
broke out in another. The poor gipsy curs, who, like errant thieves,
could not hold up their heads in an honest house, were worried and
insulted by the gentlemen dogs of the establishment, without offering
to make resistance; the very curs of my Lady Lillycraft bullied them
with impunity.

The examination was conducted with great mildness and indulgence by
the Squire, partly from the kindness of his nature, and partly, I
suspect, because his heart yearned towards the culprit, who had found
great favour in his eyes, as I have already observed, from the skill
he had at various times displayed i