"Sir," rejoined Hind, "you may consider yourself well off, that I have left you with all your money in your pocket to buy another, which you had best lay out before I meet you again, lest you should be worse used." So saying, he rode off in search of new booty.
To rob the rich, to act as special providence to the poor, to succour the distressed, and to plague the existence of their political opponents seem to have been as much the attributes of the seventeenth-century highwaymen as they were of that merry outlaw, Robin Hood. It is thus that, in the vilely printed pamphlets written by illiterates, composed of blunted type, struck off upon incredibly bad paper by the aid of rickety hand-presses, and sold at the old country fairs, the highwaymen have always had a niche in the affections of the rustics, who had no purse nor gear to lose. Hind was of this type, whether actually or as the creature of legend it is now no use to inquire. We learn, for instance, how, riding through the town of Warwick, and hearing a commotion in a side street, he drew rein to discover the cause. An innkeeper, he was told, had been arrested at the suit of a rascally old usurer, for a debt of twenty pounds. It was the work of a few minutes for Hind to leap from his horse, to pay the money, and thus to release the innkeeper. "Generosity!" you will exclaim. Well, no; or, at any rate, merely a generous impulse that cost him nothing but a little physical exertion, for what was easier to Hind than recovering again those twenty sovereigns! He followed the money-lender out of the town, and, overtaking him in a lonely place, said, with his forceful politeness, "My good friend, I lent you, of late, a sum of twenty pounds. Repay at once, or I take your miserable life!"
Twenty sovereigns were with fear and trembling handed over, together with another twenty, "for interest," and when this ill-used man sought to recover his due from the innkeeper under legal plea of "duress," or what not technical terms, he was not only defeated on the innkeeper producing his signed discharge, but was soundly flogged into the bargain.
The fanciful book of Hind's exploits called The English Gusman, published in 1652, contains some marvellous stories, notably that in which a witch gives him a talisman protecting him for three years. He had been staying the night at the "George" inn, Hatfield, and leaving early the next morning, encountered an ill-favoured old woman who begged alms of him.
"His horse presently staid, and would go no further. 'Sir,' said the old woman, 'I have something to say to you, and then you shall be gone.'
"Hind, not liking her Countenance, puld out five shillings and gave her, thinking she would but like a Gipsee, tell his fortune, said, 'Good woman, I am in haste.'
"'Sir,' said she, 'I have staid all this morning to speak to you; and would you have me lose my labour?'
"'Speak your mind,' said Hind.
"The old woman began thus: 'Captain Hind, you ride and go in many dangers; wherefore, by my poor skill, I have thought of a way to preserve you for the space of three years; but, that time being past, you are no more than an ordinary man, and a mischance may fall on you, as well as another; but if you be in England, come to me, and I will renew the Verteu of this Charm again.'