He imparted to Ripton, at the eleventh hour, that they must do it
themselves, to which Ripton heavily assented.

On the day preceding poor Tom's doomed appearance before the magistrate,
Dame Bakewell had an interview with Austin, who went to Raynham
immediately, and sought Adrian's counsel upon what was to be done.
Homeric laughter and nothing else could be got out of Adrian when he
heard of the doings of these desperate boys: how they had entered Dame
Bakewell's smallest of retail shops, and purchased tea, sugar, candles,
and comfits of every description, till the shop was clear of customers:
how they had then hurried her into her little back-parlour, where Richard
had torn open his shirt and revealed the coils of rope, and Ripton
displayed the point of a file from a serpentine recess in his jacket: how
they had then told the astonished woman that the rope she saw and the
file she saw were instruments for the liberation of her son; that there
existed no other means on earth to save him, they, the boys, having
unsuccessfully attempted all: how upon that Richard had tried with the
utmost earnestness to persuade her to disrobe and wind the rope round her
own person: and Ripton had aired his eloquence to induce her to secrete
the file: how, when she resolutely objected to the rope, both boys began
backing the file, and in an evil hour, she feared, said Dame Bakewell,
she had rewarded the gracious permission given her by Sir Miles Papworth
to visit her son, by tempting Tom to file the Law. Though, thanks be to
the Lord! Dame Bakewell added, Tom had turned up his nose at the file,
and so she had told young Master Richard, who swore very bad for a young
gentleman.

"Boys are like monkeys," remarked Adrian, at the close of his explosions,
"the gravest actors of farcical nonsense that the world possesses. May I