1641 THXLIfEOf 



truth, for I folemnly fwear I never before faw 

 the man, nor ever was in his ho. fe. 



But the f.mmit of ridicule was climbed by 

 Mr. Clay, of Birmingham, who bawled out 

 aloud that I had cheated him. Mr. Bond im- 

 inediateiy afked how I had done it. Mr. Clay 

 faid he held a note of hand of mine, for, I think, 

 ten pounds. Mr. Bond enquired where it was ? 

 At Birmingham was the reply. " What is its 

 date?" "About ten years.'* A loud laugh: 

 immediately fhook the whole audience, and 

 Mr. Clay was told that that office was not the 

 place to recover debts; befides that the flatuteof 

 limitations flood as an infuperable barrier in his 

 way. This was the more malicious on the part 

 of Clay, owing to another laughable circum- 

 ftance. About the time he fpoke to, I did really 

 borrow the money of him, for which I gave 

 him a note payable at the houfe of a very rc- 

 fpevftable gentlemen, but whofe fingularity of 

 name, gave rife to fufpicions in Mr. Clay's fa- 

 pient brain. That night, or the night follow- 

 ing, there appeared in the newfpapers, one of 

 thofc paragraphs that are calculated to fet the 

 world a flaring, flating that a fraud on the Bank 

 to a very large amount had been committed, 

 and giving a defcription of a perfon, which 

 nearly agreed with my own. Clay read this, 

 and forthwith went to confult with a juflice of 



the 



