has never been the equal of the drummer of Tedworth. His
was the distinction to inspire terror the length and breadth of a
kingdom, to set a nation by the ears--nay, even to disturb the peace of
Church and Crown.

When the Cromwellian wars broke out, he was in his prime, a stout,
sturdy Englishman, suffering, as did his fellows, from the misrule of
the Stuarts, and ready for any desperate step that might better his
fortunes. Volunteering, therefore, under the man of blood and iron,
tradition has it that from the first battle to the last his drum was
heard inspiring the revolutionists to mighty deeds of valor. The
conflict at an end, Charles beheaded, and the Fifth Monarchy men
creating chaos in their noisy efforts to establish the Kingdom of God on
earth, he lapsed into an obscurity that endured until the Restoration.
Then he reemerged, not as a veteran living at ease on laurels well won,
but as a wandering beggar, roving from shire to shire in quest of alms,
which he implored to the accompaniment of fearsome music from his
beloved drum.

Thus he journeyed, undisturbed and gaining a sufficient living, until he
chanced in the spring of 1661 to invade the quiet Wiltshire village of
Tedworth. At that time the interests of Tedworth were identical with the
interests of a certain Squire Mompesson, and he, being a gouty,
irritable individual, was little disposed to have his peace and the
peace of Tedworth disturbed by the drummer's loud bawling and louder
drumming. At his orders rough hands seized the unhappy wanderer, blows
rained upon him, and he was driven from Tedworth minus his drum. In vain
he begged the wrathful Mompesson to restore it to him; in vain, with the
tears streaming down his battle-worn, weather-beaten face, he protested
that the drum was the only friend left to him in all the world; and in
vain he related the happy memories it held for him. "Go," he was roughly
told--"go, and be thankful thou escapest so lightly!" So go he did, and
whither he went nobody knew, and for the moment nobody cared.

But all Tedworth soon had occasion to wish that his lamentations had
moved the Squire to pity. Hardly a month later, when Mompesson had
journeyed to the capital to pay his respects to the King, his family
were aroused in the middle of the night by angry voices and an incessant
banging on the front door. Windows were tried; entrance was vehemently
demanded. Within, panic reigned at once. The house was situated in a