At this change of fortune I could not but remember how, years
before, he had sneered at me as a "charity brat." I fancy he
remembered it too, for when I met him face to face one day, as I
returned from school, coming out of his uncle's office, he flushed
deeply and then gave me such a look of hatred that I felt uneasy
for days after.
Cyrus had never borne a good name in Shrewsbury, and after his
father's death he seemed to grow reckless. Dick Cludde was still at
college, though I never heard that he did any good there, and in
the vacations he and Cyrus consorted much together, and became in
fact the ringleaders of a wild set whose doings were a scandal in
Shrewsbury for many a day. Cludde, it seemed, had made a jaunt to
London with other young bloods at the end of the term in the
December of this year 1694, to see the great pageant of Queen
Mary's funeral.
The adventure did him no good, for when he returned to Shrewsbury
he formed, with Vetch and others of his kidney, a gang in imitation
of the Mohocks, as they were called--the band of dissolute young
ruffians who then infested London, wrenching off knockers,
molesting women in the streets, pinking sober citizens, and
tumbling the old watchmen into the gutters. Our streets at night
became the scene of riotous exploits of this kind, and our watch,
being old and feeble men, were quite unable to cope with the
rioters, so that decent folk began to be afraid to stir abroad
after dark.
Pages:
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40