The shouts of his followers had brought others to join them, and as he neared Crouch End, traversing the lane which takes its name from Du-Val, and in which a house frequented by that gayest of robbers stands, or stood, “A highwayman! a highwayman!” rang in his ears, in a discordant chorus of many voices.
The whole neighborhood was alarmed by the cries, and by the tramp of horses: the men of Hornsey rushed into the road to seize the fugitive, and women held up their babes to catch a glimpse of the flying cavalcade, which seemed to gain number and animation as it advanced. Suddenly three horsemen appear in the road — they hear the uproar and the din. “A highwayman! a highwayman!” cry the voices: “stop him, stop him!” But it is no such easy matter. With a pistol in each hand, and his bridle in his teeth, Turpin passed boldly on. His fierce looks — his furious steed — the impetus with which he pressed forward, bore down all before him. The horsemen gave way, and only served to swell the list of his pursuers.
“We have him now — we have him now!” cried Paterson, exultingly. “Shout for your lives. The turnpike man will hear us. Shout again — again! The fellow has heard it. The gate is shut. We have him. Ha, ha!”
The Hornsey Gate
The old Hornsey toll-bar was a high gate, with chevaux-de-frise on the upper rail. It may be so still. The gate was swung into its lock, and, like a tiger in his lair, the prompt custodian of the turnpike trusts, ensconced within his doorway, held himself in readiness to spring upon the runaway. But Dick kept steadily on. He coolly calculated the height of the gate; he looked to the right and to the left — nothing better offered; he spoke a few words of encouragement to Bess, gently patted her neck, then struck his spurs into her sides, and cleared the spikes by an inch. Out rushed the amazed turnpike man, thus unmercifully bilked, and was nearly trampled to death under the feet of Paterson’s horse.
“Open the gate, fellow, and be expeditious,” shouted the chief constable.
“Not I,” said the man, sturdily, “unless I gets my dues. I’ve been done once already. But strike me stupid if I’m done a second time.”
“Don’t you perceive that’s a highwayman? Don’t you know that I’m chief constable of Westminster?” said Paterson, showing his staff. “How dare you oppose me in the discharge of my duty?”
“That may be, or it may not be,” said the man, doggedly. “But you don’t pass, unless I gets the blunt, and that’s the long and short on it.”
Amidst a storm of oaths, Coates flung down a crown piece, and the gate was thrown open.
Turpin took advantage of this delay to breathe his mare; and, striking into a by-lane at Duckett’s Green, cantered easily along in the direction of Tottenham. Little repose was allowed him. Yelling like a pack of hounds in full cry, his pursuers were again at his heels. He had now to run the gauntlet of the long straggling town of Tottenham, and various were the devices of the populace to entrap him. The whole place was up in arms, shouting, screaming, running, dancing, and hurling every possible description of missile at the horse and her rider. Dick merrily responded to their clamor as he flew past, and laughed at the brickbats that were showered thick as hail, and quite as harmlessly, around him.
Turpin’s flight through Edmonton
A few more miles’ hard riding tired the volunteers, and before the chase reached Edmonton most of them were “nowhere.” Here fresh relays were gathered, and a strong field was again mustered. John Gilpin himself could not have excited more astonishment amongst the good folks of Edmonton, than did our highwayman as he galloped through their town. Unlike the men of Tottenham, the mob received him with acclamations, thinking, no doubt, that, like “the citizens of famous London town,” he rode for a wager. Presently, however, borne on the wings of the blast, came the cries of “Turpin! Dick Turpin!” and the hurrahs were changed to hootings; but such was the rate at which our highwayman rode, that no serious opposition could be offered to him.
A man in a donkey-cart, unable to get out of the way, drew himself up in the middle of the road. Turpin treated him as he had done the dub at the knapping jigger, and cleared the driver and his little wain with ease. This was a capital stroke, and well adapted to please the multitude, who are ever taken with a brilliant action. “Hark away, Dick!” resounded on all hands, while hisses were as liberally bestowed upon his pursuers.
* * * * *
109. Since the earlier editions of this Romance were published, we regret to state — for to us, at least, it is matter of regret, though probably not to the travellers along the Edgeware Road — that this gentle ascent has been cut through, and the fair prospect from its brow utterly destroyed.
CHAPTER 5
THE SHORT PIPE
The Peons are capital horsemen, and several times we saw them, at a gallop, throw the rein on the horse’s neck, take from one pocket a bag of loose tobacco, and, with a piece of paper, or a leaf of Indian corn, make a cigar, and then take out a flint and steel and light it.
Head’s Rough Notes.
Away they fly past scattered cottages, swiftly and skimmingly, like eagles on the wing, along the Enfield highway. All were well mounted, and the horses, now thoroughly warmed, had got into their paces, and did their work beautifully. None of Coates’s party lost ground, but they maintained it at the expense of their steeds, which were streaming like water-carts, while Black Bess had scarcely turned a hair.
Turpin, the reader already knows, was a crack rider; he was the crack rider of England of his time, and, perhaps, of any time. The craft and mystery of jockeyship was not so well understood in the eighteenth as it is in the nineteenth century; men treated their horses differently, and few rode them as well as many ride now, when every youngster takes to the field as naturally as if he had been bred a Guacho. Dick Turpin was a glorious exception to the rule, and anticipated a later age. He rode wonderfully lightly, yet sat his saddle to perfection, distributing the weight so exquisitely that his horse scarcely felt his pressure; he yielded to every movement made by the animal, and became, as it were, part and parcel of itself; he took care Bess should be neither strained nor wrung. Freely, and as lightly as a feather, was she borne along; beautiful was it to see her action — to watch her style and temper of covering the ground; and many a first-rate Meltonian might have got a wrinkle from Turpin’s seat and conduct.
We have before stated that it was not Dick’s object to ride away from his pursuers — he could have done that at any moment. He liked the fun of the chase, and would have been sorry to put a period to his own excitement. Confident in his mare, he just kept her at such speed as should put his pursuers completely to it, without in the slightest degree inconveniencing himself. Some judgment of the speed at which they went may be formed, when we state that little better than an hour had elapsed and nearly twenty miles had been ridden over. “Not bad travelling that,” methinks we hear the reader exclaim.
“By the mother that bore me,” said Titus, as they went along in this slapping style — Titus, by-the-by, rode a big, Roman-nosed, powerful horse, well adapted to his weight, but which required a plentiful exercise both
