i68 THE COACHING ERA 



'Well,' said I, 'you will not be afraid of being robbed 

 another time, for, you see there is nothing in it.' 



'Oh! but I am,' said she, 'and now I am in terror 

 lest he return, for I have given him a purse with bad 

 money in it, that I carry on purpose.'" 



Jack Ovet, the son of a shoemaker, considered his 

 prospers as highwayman so bright that he had the 

 presumption to ask a lady to join them. He saw, and 

 fell instantly in love with her when, in pursuit of his 

 calling, he stopped the Worcester stage-coach. His 

 infatuation did not prevent his robbing the lady of 

 twenty guineas, though he protested that he only wished 

 to borrow them, and would return them if she would 

 favour him with her address. This she did and soon 

 afterwards received, not her stolen property, but a 

 bombastic letter from Ovet, in which he declared that, 

 though he had taken a few paltry guineas, she had 

 committed a far greater robbery, for she had stolen his 

 heart. This he valued considerably higher than did the 

 objedt of his affeftions, who replied with a letter which 

 was calculated to pierce even a highwayman's self 

 esteem: 



"You have broken your word, in not sending me what 

 you villainously took from me; but, not valuing that, 

 let me tell you, for fear you should have too great a 

 conceit of yourself, that you are the first to my recol- 

 lection whom I ever hated; and sealing my hatred with 

 the hopes of quickly reading your dying speech, in case 

 you die in London, I presume to subscribe myself, — 

 Yours never to command."^ 



^ Lives of the Highwaymen. Johnson. 



