go with us, I hope, for 'tis you that
charged me with her.' 'No, not I,' says the mercer; 'I tell you I have
nothing to say to her.' 'But pray, sir, do,' says the constable; 'I
desire it of you for your own sake, for the justice can do nothing
without you.' 'Prithee, fellow,' says the mercer, 'go about your
business; I tell you I have nothing to say to the gentlewoman. I
charge you in the king's name to dismiss her.' 'Sir,' says the
constable, 'I find you don't know what it is to be constable; I beg of
you don't oblige me to be rude to you.' 'I think I need not; you are
rude enough already,' says the mercer. 'No, sir,' says the constable,
'I am not rude; you have broken the peace in bringing an honest woman
out of the street, when she was about her lawful occasion, confining
her in your shop, and ill-using her here by your servants; and now can
you say I am rude to you? I think I am civil to you in not commanding
or charging you in the king's name to go with me, and charging every
man I see that passes your door to aid and assist me in carrying you by
force; this you cannot but know I have power to do, and yet I forbear
it, and once more entreat you to go with me.' Well, he would not for
all this, and gave the constable ill language. However, the constable
kept his temper, and would not be provoked; and then I put in and said,
'Come, Mr. Constable, let him alone; I shall find ways enough to fetch
him before a magistrate, I don't fear that; but there's the fellow,'
says I, 'he was the man that seized on me as I was innocently going
along the street, and you are a witness of the violence with me since;
give me leave to charge you with him, and carry him before the
justice.' 'Yes, madam,' says the constable; and turning to the fellow
'Come, young gentleman,' says he to the journeyman, 'you must go along
with us; I hope you are not above the constable's power, though your
master is.'

The fellow looked like a condemned thief, and hung back, then looked at
his master, as if he could help him; and he, like a fool, encourage the
fellow to be rude, and he truly resisted the constable, and pushed him
back with a good force when he went to lay hold on him, at which the
constable knocked him down, and called out for help; and immediately
the shop was filled with people, and the constable seized the master
and man, and all his servants.

This first ill consequence of this fray was, that the woman they had
taken, who w