THE ROBBER OUTWITTED.
Willie Bailie was a household name about a hundred years ago, in the upper parts of Clydesdale. Men, women, and children had heard of Willie, and the greater proportion had seen him. Few, in his time, could excel Willie in dexterity in his profession, which consisted of abstracting money from people's pockets, and in other predatory feats. He frequented the fairs all round the district, and no man's purse was safe if Willie happened to be in the market. The beautiful village of Moffat, in Annandale, was one of his frequent places of resort when any of its fairs happened to be held, and here, among the honest farmers, he was invariably successful; and to show his professional skill on such occasions, he has been known to rob a man and return his purse to him two or three times in the same day; but this he did only with his intimate friends, who were kind to him in providing lodgings, when plying his nominal occupation of tinker from one farm-house to another; in the case of others, it was, of course, different. His wife abetted him in all his thieving exploits, and generally sat in a place in the outskirts of the town, that had been previously fixed on, and there received in silence whatever spoil her husband might throw incidentally into her lap in the shape of her fairing. But Willie was a privileged freebooter, was generous withal, and well liked by the people in the neighborhood, on whom he rarely committed any acts of plunder, and any one might have trusted what he called his "honor."
Willie's character was well known both to high and low, and he became renowned for a heroism which few who esteem respectability would now covet. The high estimation in which he was held as an adept in his profession, induced a Scottish nobleman to lay a high bet, with an Englishman of some rank, that Willie would actually rob and fairly despoil a certain noted riever on the southern side of the border, who was considered one of the most daring and dexterous that frequented the highways in those dubious times, and one whose exploits the gentleman was in the habit of extolling. The Scottish nobleman conferred with Willie, and informed him of the project—a circumstance which mightily pleased our hero, and into which he entered with all enthusiasm. The interest which Willie took in the matter was to the nobleman a guarantee of ultimate success; and, having given all the marks of the robber, and directed him to the particular place on the road where he was sure to meet with him, he left it to Willie himself to arrange the subsequent mode of procedure.
Willie's ingenuity was instantly at work, and he concocted a scheme which fairly carried him through the enterprise. He got an old, frail-looking pony, partially lame, and with long, shaggy hair. He filled a bag of considerable dimensions with a great quantity of old buttons, and useless pieces of jingling metal. He next arrayed himself in beggarly habiliments, with clouted shoes, tattered under-garments, a cloak mended in a hundred places, and a soiled, broad-brimmed bonnet on his head. The money-bag he tied firmly behind the saddle; he placed a pair of pistols under his coat, and a short dagger close by his side. Thus accoutred he wended his way slowly toward the border, both he and the animal apparently in the last stage of helplessness and decrepitude. The bag behind was carefully covered by the cloak, that spread its duddy folds over the hinder parts of the poor lean beast that carried him. Sitting in a crouching posture on the saddle, with a long beard and an assumed palsified shaking of the hand, nobody would have conceived for a moment that Willie was a man in the prime of life, of a well-built, athletic frame, with more power in his arm than three ordinary men, and of an intrepid and adventurous spirit, that feared nothing, but dared every thing. In this plight, our worthy went dodging over the border, and entered the neighboring kingdom, where every person that met him regarded him as a poor, doited, half-insane body, fit only to lie down at the side of a hedge, and die unheeded, beside the crazy steed. In this way, he escaped without suspicion, and advanced without an adventure to the skirts of the wood, where he expected to encounter his professional brother.
When Willie entered the road that led through the dark and suspicious forest, he was all on the alert for the highwayman. Every rustling among the trees and bushes arrested his attention, not knowing but a whizzing ball might in a moment issue therefrom, or that the redoubted freebooter himself might spring upon him like a tiger. Neither of these, however, occurred; but a man on horseback was seen advancing slowly and cautiously on the road before him. This might be he, or it might not, but Willie now recollected every particular mark given of the man with whom he expected to encounter, and he was prepared for the most vigilant observation. As the horseman advanced, Willie was fully convinced that he had met with his man, and this was the critical moment, for here was the identical highwayman.
"How now, old fellow?" exclaimed the robber; "what seek you in these parts? Where are you bound for, with this magnificent equipage of yours?"
"Why, to tell you the truth, I am e'en a puir honest man frae Scotland, gaen a wee bit farther south on business of some consequence, and I am glad I have met with a gentleman like you, and I would fain put myself under your protection in this dreary wood, as I am a stranger, and wadna like ony mischance to befa', considering the errand I am on."
The robber eyed Willie with a sort of leer, thinking he had fallen in with an old driveling fool, at whose expense he might amuse himself with impunity, and play a little on his simplicity.
"What makes you afraid of this wood?" said the robber.
"Why, I was told that it was infested with highwaymen; and, to tell you the truth, as I take you to be an honest man and a gentleman, I hae something in this bag that I wadna like to lose, for twa reasons—baith because of its value, and because it was intrusted to my care."