"There, the gig is ready," cried Mr. Jacobs; "you come along," and the
ex-thief pushed the thief hastily off the premises and drove him away
with speed.

George Fielding gave a bitter sigh. This was a fresh mortification. He
had for the last two months been defending Robinson against the
surmises of the village.

Villages are always concluding there is something wrong about people.

"What does he do?" inquired our village.

"Where does he get his blue coat with brass buttons, his tartan
waistcoat and green satin tie with red ends? We admit all this looks
like a gentleman. But yet, somehow, a gentleman is a horse of another
color than this Robinson."

George had sometimes laughed at all this, sometimes been very angry,
and always stood up stoutly for his friend and lodger.

And now the fools were right and he was wrong. His friend and protege
was handcuffed before his eyes and carried off to the county jail amid
the grins and stares of a score of gaping rustics, who would make a
fine story of it this evening in both public-houses; and a hundred
voices would echo some such conversational Tristich as this:

1st Rustic. "I tawld un as much, dinn't I now, Jarge?"

2d Rustic. "That ye did, Richard, for I heerd ee."