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DICK TURPIN, 



WITH A FEW WORDS ON HIGHWAYMEN.* 



SCHILLER'S " Robbers" is said to have set the youth of Germany 

 in flame to have driven many of the bold aspiring spirits of the day 

 wearied of the flatness and insipidity of an existence devoid of ex- 

 citement and adventure into the thick forests of Bohemia, and Sal- 

 vator-like caverns deep hidden in the rocky banks of the Danube, 

 where they revelled throughout the day, quaffing, like their prototypes, 

 healths to the god of Thieves; and when night had cast her mantle 

 on those swarthy shades, issued forth in whirlwind bands to burn a 

 few villages, cut a few throats, carry away a few women, and in 

 short, to emulate to the full all the amiable atrocities of Moor and 

 his comrades. 



Now, but that we live in an Utilitarian age, we should anticipate a 

 similar effect being produced by " Rookwood." Dick Turpin, and his 

 Jidus Achates Tom King, are to the full as fascinating to our " broths 

 of boys," and as worthy of imitation as Moor and Grimm nay, more 

 so as not having quite such sanguinary propensities; and in case 

 such an event should happen, we shall hold Mr. Ainsworth respon- 

 sible for any abstraction of our purses which may ensue (indeed, we 

 suspect by the aid of Turpin and his merry men, he has already found 

 a way to the pockets of. the lieges), as well as for any further state 

 of moral delinquency into which the rising generation may decline. 

 Henceforth we make no doubt his name will be coupled with that of 

 Schiller as a grand instigator to robbery ; and highwaymen yet un- 

 fledged will breathe into the Ordinary's ears that it was the perusal of 

 the inflammatory pages of "Rookwood" which led them into the com- 

 mission of their heinous offences. We are the more inclined to be- 

 lieve this from hearing that a few days ago it was gravely proposed, 

 by certain officers of a mess, at a certain barrack not twenty miles 

 from town, and in a locality not uncongenial to such an undertaking, 

 after a discussion of the deeds of Turpin in " Rookwood" that they 

 should order their horses call for coffee and pistols mount sally 

 forth, and take a midnight scour over the heath after the good old 

 fashion of the knights of the road ! Could stronger proof be wanting 

 of the deleterious tendency of the work than this ? Mr. Ainsworth 

 must abide by the consequences. What youthful mind can resist 

 such advice as the following he is describing Turpin: 



" Dick Turpin was the Ultimus Romanorum, the last of the race which 

 (we were almost about to say we regret) is now altogether extinct. Seve- 

 ral successors he had, it is true, but no name worthy to be recorded after 

 his own. With him, expired the chivalrous spirit which animated succes- 

 sively the bosoms of so many Knights of the Road ; with him, died away 

 that passionate love of enterprise, that high spirit of devotion to the fair 

 sex, which was first breathed upon the highway by the gay, gallant Che- 

 valier Du Val, the Bayard of the road Le Filou sans peur et sans reproche 



* Rookwood, a Romance, 3 vols. R. Bentley. 



