besieging Vienna, because, though the Austrians were Papists, and though
the Turks were ostensibly on the side of the Hungarian reformers whom
the Austrian Government had persecuted, he had read the history of the
Turks and could not pray for their victory over Christians of any
denomination. "Though then but a young man, and a younger author" (this
was in 1683), "he opposed it and wrote against it, which was taken very
unkindly indeed." From these words it would seem that Defoe had thus
early begun to write pamphlets on questions of the hour. As he was on
the weaker side, and any writing might have cost him his life, it is
probable that he did not put his name to any of these tracts; none of
them have been identified; but his youth was strangely unlike his mature
manhood if he was not justified in speaking of himself as having been
then an "author." Nor was he content merely with writing. It would have
been little short of a miracle if his restless energy had allowed him to
lie quiet while the air was thick with political intrigue. We may be
sure that he had a voice in some of the secret associations in which
plans were discussed of armed resistance to the tyranny of the King. We
have his own word for it that he took part in the Duke of Monmouth's
rising, when the whips of Charles were exchanged for the scorpions of
James. He boasted of this when it became safe to do so, and the truth of
the boast derives incidental confirmation from the fact that the names
of three of his fellow-students at Newington appear in the list of the
victims of Jeffreys and Kirke.

Escaping the keen hunt that was made for all participators in the
rebellion, Defoe, towards the close of 1685, began business as a hosier
or hose-factor in Freeman's Court, Corn hill. The precise nature of his
trade has been disputed; and it does not particularly concern us here.
When taunted afterwards with having been apprentice to a hosier, he
indignantly denied the fact, and explained that though he had been a