276 FIELD AND HEDGEROW. 



through the very next parish inquired of a local man if 

 somebody called Sydney Smith did not once live in that 

 neighbourhood. ' Yes/ was the reply, ' I've heard all 

 about Sydney Smith ; I can tell you. He was a high- 

 wayman, and was hung on that hill there.' He would 

 have shown the very stump of the gallows-tree as proof 

 positive, like Jack Cade's bricks, alive in the chimney to 

 this day. 



There really was a highwayman, however, whose 

 adventures are said to have suggested one of the charac- 

 ters in the romance of ■ Lorna Doone.' This desperate 

 fellow had of course his houses of call, where he could 

 get refreshment safely, on the moors. One bitter 

 winter's day the robber sat down to a hearty dinner in 

 an inn at Exford. Placing his pistols before him, he 

 made himself comfortable, and ate and drank his fill. 

 By-and-by an old woman entered, and humbly took a 

 seat in a corner far from the fire. In time the highway- 

 man observed the wretched, shivering creature, and of 

 his princely generosity told her to come and sit by the 

 hearth. The old woman gladly obeyed, and crouched 

 beside him. Presently, as he sat absorbed in his meal, 

 his arms were suddenly pinioned from behind. The old 

 woman had him tight, so that he could not use his weapons, 

 while at a call constables, who had been posted about, 

 rushed in and secured him. The old woman was in 

 fact a man in disguise. A relation of the thief-taker 

 still lives and tells the tale. The highwayman's mare, 

 mentioned in the novel, had been trained to come 

 at his call, and was so ungovernable that they shot 

 her. 



Such tracts of open country, moors, and unenclosed 

 hills were the haunts of highwaymen till a late period, 

 and memories of the gallows, and of escapes from them, 



