It is pleasant to read of honest men occasionally coming to their own again, and of incidents of painful retribution. Such an incident as that recorded above deserves a fellow, and we find it in the painful adventure in which Tom Taylor was the luckless sufferer. We do not hear much of Tom Taylor, who was, indeed, more of a pickpocket than a highwayman. We do learn, however, that he was the son of a clergyman, and that "he was executed along with Moll Jones." Clearly, Tom Taylor was an undesirable and the companion of undesirables. He was accustomed to dress himself in smart clothes and attend theatres and public entertainments, and there—an unsuspected fine gentleman—to pick pockets. On one such occasion he emptied a gentleman's pocket of forty guineas, and we are told that, in a disguise, he seated himself the next night beside the same person, who recognised him but made no sign, having this time come prepared. He had, in fact, baited his pocket with a handful of guineas, which set up a pleasant jingling and made poor Tom's mouth water. Poor Tom, we say advisedly, bearing in mind the sequel. He began presently to "dive" for those guineas and found, to his dismay, that the gentleman had really in the truest sense, "baited" his pocket, for it had been sewn all round with fish-hooks, and the wretched Taylor's hand was held fast.
Having in vain attempted to disentangle himself, he said to the gentleman: "Sir, by a mistake, I have somehow put my hand into your pocket, instead of into my own"; but, without taking the least notice, that merciless person rose from his seat and made for the "Rose" tavern, Tom helplessly along with him, his hand all the while remaining in the pocket. Arrived there, it was no difficult matter to make him cry "Mercy!" and to induce him to send for one of his comrades, to bail him out, so to say. It cost the unfortunate Tom Taylor eighty guineas to get free again. The account of these things then concludes on the proper note of poetic justice: "Nor was the gentleman satisfied with this, but caned him in a most unmerciful manner, and then turned him out to the mob, who ducked him in a pond, and broke one of his legs."
The succeeding chapters of Tom Taylor's chequered career do not concern us, but we learn, without surprise, that this ferocious buffeting and bruising—to say nothing of the fish-hooks—determined him to abandon the "diving" trade.
JONATHAN WILD
To cheat that arch-rogue and cunning friend and betrayer of rogues, Jonathan Wild, out of a place in these pages would be too mean an action. He towers above the ordinary run of bad men as a very giant in wickedness. Although he was himself no highwayman, he was friend of and associate with all of their trade, and as such has a right here.
Jonathan Wild was a native of Wolverhampton, the son, according to some, of a carpenter; but, by more trustworthy records, his father was a wig-maker. He was born about 1682. His father apprenticed him to a Birmingham buckle-maker. While at Birmingham he married, but, deserting his wife and child, he made for London, and was for a short period a gentleman's servant. Returning for a brief space to the buckle-making trade, he soon found himself in debt, and then, by what was a natural transition in those times, lodged in the Poultry Compter. The Compter (it is also styled the Wood Street Compter) was something over and above a prison for debtors and others: and was indeed nothing less than an academy and forcing-house of villainies, where incipient scoundrels were brought on early in season, like cucumbers under glass. It was not singular in this, for all the prisons of that age shared the like well-earned reputation. Something of the horrors of imprisonment for debt, as then practised, may be judged by the fact that Wild was here for four years; but for a portion of the time he had the advantage over his fellow-prisoners of being appointed assistant-gaoler. Wild never at any time lacked address and tact, and these qualities here stood him in good stead.
It was in this abode of despair that he first met Mary Milliner, who was ever afterwards associated with him. She was already old in crime, though not in years, and was his initiator into the first practical rogueries he knew. But he was a criminal by instinct, and needed only introductions to the world of crime. Once shown the methods in vogue, he not only became a master in their use, but speedily improved upon them, to the wonderment and admiration of all the cross-coves in London.
Released at length from durance, he and Mary Milliner set up a vile establishment in Lewkenor's Lane, and later took a low public-house, a resort of the padding-culls of the City—the sign of the "Cock," in Cock Alley, Cripplegate.