a schoolboy he had read his life at the end of the dictionary. My friend
asked me, in the next place, if there would not be some danger in coming
home late, in case the Mohocks[175] should be abroad. "I assure you,"
says he, "I thought I had fallen into their hands last night; for I
observed two or three lusty black men that followed me half-way up Fleet
Street, and mended their pace behind me, in proportion as I put on[176]
to get away from them. You must know," continued the Knight with a smile,
"I fancied they had a mind to _hunt_ me; for I remember an honest
gentleman in my neighbourhood, who was served such a trick in King
Charles the Second's time, for which reason he has not ventured himself
in town ever since. I might have shown them very good sport, had this
been their design; for as I am an old fox-hunter, I should have turned
and dodged, and have played them a thousand tricks they had never seen in
their lives before." Sir Roger added, that if these gentlemen had any
such intention, they did not succeed very well in it; "for I threw them
out," says he, "at the end of Norfolk Street, where I doubled the corner,
and got shelter in my lodgings before they could imagine what was become
of me. However," says the Knight, "if Captain Sentry will make one with
us to-morrow night, and if you will both of you call upon me about four
o'clock, that we may be at the house before it is full, I will have my
coach in readiness to attend you, for John tells me he has got the
fore-wheels mended."

The Captain, who did not fail to meet me there at the appointed hour, bid
Sir Roger fear nothing, for that he had put on the same sword which he
made use of at the battle of Steenkirk. Sir Roger's servants, and among
the rest my old friend the butler, had, I found, provided themselves with
good oaken plants, to attend their master upon this occasion. When we
had placed him in his coach, with myself at his left hand, the Captain
before him, and his butler at the head of his footmen in the rear, we
conveyed him in safety to the play-house, where after having marched up
the entry in good order, the Captain and I went in with him, and seated
him betwixt us in the pit. As soon as the house was full, and the candles
lighted, my old friend stood up and looked about him with that pleasure,
which a mind seasoned with humanity[177] naturally feels in itself, at
the sight of a multitude of people who seemed pleased with one another,
and partak