every walled town in the kingdom
followed the example of the capital. On every highway parties of armed
men were posted with orders to stop passengers of suspicious appearance.
During a few days it was hardly possible to perform a journey without a
passport, or to procure posthorses without the authority of a justice
of the peace. Nor was any voice raised against these precautions. The
common people indeed were, if possible, more eager than the public
functionaries to bring the traitors to justice. This eagerness may
perhaps be in part ascribed to the great rewards promised by the royal
proclamation. The hatred which every good Protestant felt for Popish
cutthroats was not a little strengthened by the songs in which the
street poets celebrated the lucky hackney coachman who had caught
his traitor, had received his thousand pounds, and had set up as a
gentleman. [673] The zeal of the populace could in some places hardly
be kept within the limits of the law. At the country seat of Parkyns
in Warwickshire, arms and accoutrements sufficient to equip a troop of
cavalry were found. As soon as this was known, a furious mob assembled,
pulled down the house and laid the gardens utterly waste. [674] Parkyns
himself was tracked to a garret in the Temple. Porter and Keyes, who
had fled into Surrey, were pursued by the hue and cry, stopped by the
country people near Leatherhead, and, after some show of resistance,
secured and sent to prison. Friend was found hidden in the house of a
Quaker. Knightley was caught in the dress of a fine lady, and recognised
in spite of his patches and paint. In a few days all the chief
conspirators were in custody except Barclay, who succeeded in making his
escape to France.

At the same time some notorious malecontents were arrested, and were
detained for a time on suspicion. Old Roger Lestrange, now in his
eightieth year, was taken up. Ferguson was found hidden under a bed
in Gray's Inn Lane, and was, to the general joy, locked up in Newgate.
[675] Meanwhile a special commission was issued for the trial of the
traitors. There was no want of evidence. For, of the conspirators who
had been seized, ten or twelve were ready to save themselves by bearing
witness against their associates. None had been deeper in guilt,
and none shrank with more abject terror from death, than Porter. The
government consented to spare him, and thus obtained, not only his
evidence, but the much more respectable evidence of P