the risks of the journey were not trifling. The peace had, all
over Europe, and nowhere more than in England, turned crowds of
old soldiers into marauders.12 Several aristocratical equipages
had been attacked even in Hyde Park. Every newspaper contained
stories of travellers stripped, bound and flung into ditches. One
day the Bristol mail was robbed; another day the Dover coach;
then the Norwich waggon. On Hounslow Heath a company of horsemen,
with masks on their faces, waited for the great people who had
been to pay their court to the King at Windsor. Lord Ossulston
escaped with the loss of two horses. The Duke of Saint Albans,
with the help of his servants, beat off the assailants. His
brother the Duke of Northumberland, less strongly guarded, fell
into their hands. They succeeded in stopping thirty or forty
coaches, and rode off with a great booty in guineas, watches and
jewellery. Nowhere, however, does the peal seem to have been so
great as on the Newmarket road. There indeed robbery was
organised on a scale unparalleled in the kingdom since the days
of Robin Hood and Little John. A fraternity of plunderers, thirty
in number according to the lowest estimate, squatted, near
Waltham Cross, under the shades of Epping Forest, and built
themselves huts, from which they sallied forth with sword and
pistol to bid passengers stand. The King and Tallard were
doubtless too well attended to be in jeopardy. But, soon after
they had passed the dangerous spot, there was a fight on the
highway attended with loss of life. A warrant of the Lord Chief
justice broke up the Maroon village for a short time,
but the dispersed thieves soon mustered again, and had the
impudence to bid defiance to the government in a cartel signed,
it was said, with their real names. The civil power was unable to
deal with this frightful evil. It was necessary that, during some