exposed. Men's minds were unsettled by the
incidents of the war on which we had just
entered; commerce was interrupted, credit
was at an end, and distress began to be
discovered among whole classes of the population
who had hitherto lived in comfort. However
harshly the law was administered, it seemed
to have no terrors for the evil-doer, and,
indeed, the undiscerning cruelty of the Statute
book defeated its own object by punishing all
crimes alike. But, a time of pecuniary
pressure is not a bad season for a bank. The
house flourished, though the country was in
great straits; and the enormous profits at that
time realised by bankers— which enabled
them to purchase large estates and outshine
the old territorial aristocracy— made the
profession as unpopular among the higher
classes as it had already become among the
unreasoning masses. By them, a banker was
looked upon as a sort of licensed forger, who
created enormous sums of money by merely
signing square pieces of flimsy paper; and I
am persuaded the robbery of a bank would
have been considered by many people quite as
meritorious an action as the dispersal of a band
of coiners. These, however, were not the
sentiments of us bankers' clerks. We felt that
we belonged to a mighty corporation, on
whose good will depended the prosperity of
half the farms in the county. We considered
ourselves the executive government, and
carried on the business of the office with a
pride and dignity that would have fitted us
for Secretaries of State. We used even to
walk the streets with a braggadocio air, as if
our pockets were loaded with gold; and if
two of us hired a gig for a country excursion,
we pretended to look under the driving-seat
as if to see to the safety of inconceivable
amounts of money: ostentatiously examining
our pistols, to show that we were determined to
defend our treasure or die. Not seldom these
precautions were required in reality; for,
when a pressure for gold occurred among our
customers, two of the most courageous of the
clerks were despatched with the required
amount, in strong leathern bags deposited
under the seat of the gig, which bags they
were to guard at the risk of their lives.
Whether from the bodily strength I was gifted
with, or from some idea that as I was not
given to boasting, I might really possess the
necessary amount of boldness, I do not know,
but I was often selected as one of the guards
to a valuable cargo of this description;
and as if to show an impartiality
between the most silent and the most talkative
of their servants, the partners united with
me in this service the most blustering, boastful,
good-hearted and loud-voiced young gentleman
I have ever known. You have most of
you heard of the famous electioneering orator
Tom Ruddle— who stood at every vacancy
for county and borough, and passed his whole
life between the elections, in canvassing for
himself or friends. Tom Ruddle was my
fellow clerk at the time I speak of, and
generally the companion of my drives in charge of
treasure.

"What would you do," I said to Tom, "in
case we are attacked?"

"Tell ye what!" said Tom, with whom that
was a favourite way of beginning almost
every sentence, "Tell ye what! I'll shoot 'em
through the head."

"Then you expect there will be more than
one?"

"I should think so," said Tom; "if there
was only one, I'd jump out of the gig and
give him a precious licking. Tell ye what!
'T would be a proper punishment for his
impertinence."

"And if half a dozen should try it?"

"Shoot 'em all!"

Never was there such a determined
custodier as the gallant Tom Ruddle.

One cold December evening we were
suddenly sent off, in charge of three bags of
coin, to be delivered into customers' hands
within ten or twelve miles of the town. The
clear frosty sky was exhilarating, our courage
was excited by the speed of the motion, the
dignity of our responsible office, and a pair of
horse-pistols which lay across the apron.

"Tell ye what!" said Tom, taking up one
of the pistols and (as I afterwards found)
full-cocking it, "I should rather like to meet
a few robbers. I would serve them as I did
those three disbanded soldiers."

"How was that?"

"Oh! it's as well," said Tom, pretending
to grow very serious, "to say nothing about
these unfortunate accidents. Blood is a
frightful thing on the conscience, and a bullet
through a fellow's head is a disagreeable sight;
but— tell ye what!— I'd do it again. Fellows
who risk their lives must take their chance,
my boy."

And here Tom put the other pistol on
full cock, and looked audaciously on both
sides of the road, as if daring the lurking
murderers to come forth and receive the
reward of their crimes. As to the story of
the soldiers, and the fearful insinuations of a
bloody deed executed on one or all, it was a
prodigious rhodomontade— for Tom was such
a tender-hearted individual, that if he had
shot a kitten it would have made him
unhappy for a week. But, to hear him talk,
you would have taken him for a civic Richard
the Third, one who had "neither pity, love,
nor fear." His whiskers also were very
ferocious, and suggestive of battle, murder, and
ruin. So, he went on playing with his
pistol, and giving himself out for an unpitying
executioner of vengeance on the guilty,
until we reached the small town where one of
our customers resided, and it was necessary
for one of us to carry one of the bags to its
destination. Tom undertook this task. As
the village at which the remaining parcels
were to be delivered was only a mile further
on, he determined to walk across the fields,