among the aristocracy of those worthies, have
long since turned out notable shams. There
is no reality to me now in the gallant highwayman
in woodcuts and penny numbers
(with number one of which was given away
part the first of "Ralph Bullocks the Reckless,
or the Poetical Pirate") careering about
Hounslow Heath, with a chivalrous, madcap
whim of robbing their uncle the earl in
his travelling carriage. I have found out the
highwayman by this time as a coarse, depraved,
strong-water-drinking ruffian, who
had merely the advantage over the ordinary
larcener in being a horsepad in lieu of a
footpad.

The subject of fetters (this is but a random
gossip on a doorstep after all, or I would not
digress) brings to my mind an appalling day-vision
I once had of a man in fetters a vision
slight, every day, common place it may be,
but one which I shall never forget, living. I
lived, when I saw the thing, in one of the
crowded streets of London- a main thoroughfare
to everything metropolitan- and in a
front room. Moreover next door there was a
large public-house, with a huge gas lamp in
front that glared into my room at night like
a fiery dragon. The situation was rather
noisy at first, the stream of vehicles being
interminable, and the neighbourhood given to
drink; but I soon grew accustomed to the
rattle of the carts, omnibuses, and cabs, and
the shrieks of the revellers given to drink as
they rushed into the Coach and Horses; or
when the drink being in them they were violently
ejected therefrom. I was supposed to
be at work close to the window; and while
the supposition was in force was in the habit
of taking a snatch of street life, just as a man
might gulp a mouthful of fresh air, raising
my eyes to the mad panorama of carriages
and people in the street beneath- the panting
multitude always running after something, or
away from somebody, but none of them able
to run as fast as the lean old man with the
scythe and the hour-glass, who outstripped
them all, and hit them when they were down.
One day- the turmoil was at its height- a
hack cab cut cleverly from the opposite side
of the way, through the line of vehicles,
neatly shaving a hearse and a bishop's carriage
(at least it had a mitre on the panels,
footmen in purple liveries, and a rosy man in
an apron inside) and drew up at the door of
the Coach and Horses. What was there extraordinary
in this, you will ask. There were
two men inside the cab, and one got out.
Nothing extraordinary yet. But the man
who was left inside the cab was tall in stature
and stalwart in build. He had a brown
handsome face, and dark curling hair and
beard. He had a fur cap on and a loose sort
of pelisse great coat covered with frogs and
embroidery. He might have had all these,
and the sea-bronze (as if he had come from
afar) on his face and the travel-stains on his
dress; have been a Polish Count, a Hungarian
General, or a Spanish Legionary, and have
driven away again as fast as he liked without
my special notice, but for his fetters. He
was literally covered with manacles. On legs
and arms, wrists and ancles, bright, shining,
new-looking, dreadfully heavy-looking chains.
If he had been the man with the Iron Mask
come to life again and from the citadel of
Pignerolles, he could not have interested me
as much as he did in these bonds. He who
had got out, and who had entered the Coach
and Horses came out again almost immedi-
ately, bearing a pot of beer, of which he gave
the fettered man to drink. He lifted the
vessel to his lips with his gyved hands so
painfully, so slowly, and yet Heavens! with
such longing eagerness in his black eyes, and
drank until, to use an excessively familiar,
but popular expression, he must have seen
"Guinness' Card" quite distinctly. Then his
companion, keeper, gaoler, kidnapper, abductor
- whatever he may have been besides- stout,
florid, common looking, with a fluffy hat, thick
boots, and a red woollen comforter tied round
his neck, took the empty measure back (he
had had something short and comfortable
himself at the bar, evidently), returned to the
cab, entered it, gave the driver a direction,
and drove off with the brown faced man in
chains. And this was all. What more should
there be? Anything or nothing: but my
work became even less than a supposition for
the rest of that day. It faded into a pure
nonentity. I began to wonder, and have been
wondering ever since about the man in chains.
Who, what was he? Where did he come from,
where was he going? Like the grim piratical
mariner in Washington Irving's story of
Wolfert Webber- the mysterious man with
the sea chest, who came in a storm and went
away in a storm, all that I was ever able to
ascertain about the man in manacles was that
he came in a cab, and that he went away in a
cab. What was his crime? Murder, felony,
high treason, return from transportation without
leave! Had he come from beyond sea,
from the hulks- was he going to the Tower,
Newgate, Milbank, Horsemonger Lane?
Where did they put the irons upon him, and
why, and how? A fur cap and fetters; a
frogged coat and fetters; mystery! Who was
the man with him. A detective policeman,
the governor of a county gaol, a dockyard
warder, a beefeater disguised in a fluffy hat
and a comforter, with red legs and slashed
shoes, with roses perhaps concealed beneath
his pepper and salt trousers and thick shoes?
Who is to tell? The man is hanged, perhaps,
by this time. Very probably he was but a
vulgar housebreaker, or an escaped convict;
but he will be a mystery to me, and I shall
think of him whenever I see the fetters
hanging over the grimy door of Newgate,
as long as there are any miserable little
mystorics in this lower life to interest, or
perplex.

I must still linger a moment by the door in