the Verderer and his officers, has sprung a herd of some 150 head, all of them the descendants of the few harried survivors of forty years ago. In addition to these there are a certain number of roe deer which some time ago were introduced by Mr. Buxton. These, however, lie more on the outskirts than in the Forest itself.

The fallow deer of the Forest, so happily preserved from extinction, are comparatively small in size, of a uniform dark brown colour, almost black, with very attenuated antlers.

In colour and other characteristics they differ from herds in other parts of the country, and are animals of considerable scientific interest. For this reason, apart from the dictates of humanity, it is all the more important that the descendants of the deer who furnished Mr. Mellish's "lemon pyes with many a good run in the old days of the eighteenth century should be preserved from the attacks (unfortunately frequent of late) of the numberless dogs. owned by persons living close to the Forest. After the many vicissitudes which this herd has gone through, it is surely entitled to live unmolested amidst the sylvan glades, where it is said to have first been introduced by the Romans.

III

ACENTURY or so ago the roads running through

Epping Forest were favourite haunts of highwaymen. There on occasion lurked the famous Dick Turpin and his associate, Tom King, who once robbed five coaches in one day. Turpin's memory is still preserved in the Forest by a little inn called "Dick Turpin's Cave," just below High Beech, and here some rusty weapons, said to have belonged to the famous highwaymen, are to this day pre

served.

Turpin's celebrated ride to York is, I believe, a fiction. The highwayman who performed the famous ride was a man called Nevinson, known as "Swift Nick." He robbed a sailor on Gad's Hill about dawn one summer's day in 1676, and by contriving to get to York bowling green the same evening established a successful alibi.

In the days before railways were dreamt of numbers of people who frequented the races at Newmarket went and returned by way of Epping Forest, and as they often carried a good deal of money with them, some daring robberies were committed.

In 1793 John Wiltshire was executed at Chelmsford for highway robbery in the Forest, where, with a couple of companions, one night in April, he had

stopped two gentlemen-Mr. Howarth and Mr. Montolieu-and robbed them of cash, bank-notes, and bills to the extent of about two thousand guineas.

The victims were so sound asleep when the chaise stopped that neither of them waked till the ruffians began to rifle their pockets. After receiving from them their watches and gold, they insisted upon their pocket-books, which demand not being instantly complied with, they forced open their waistcoats, within which they discovered and took both their pocket-books.

Wiltshire was caught at Beaconsfield, and at his trial some evidence was given showing the connection which existed between certain innkeepers and highwaymen.

Johnson, a retired bruiser, who kept a singular kind of sporting coffee-house, in a street near Lincoln's Inn Fields, proved, with apparent reluctance, that the prisoner was at Newmarket on the day of the robbery, he having lost a considerable sum at hazard in his (Johnson's) company; and also that, on that very day, he lent the prisoner his bay rat-tailed mare, on which, with his companion, Broughton, still at large, Wiltshire was supposed to have committed the robbery. The pugilist hung back during all his examination, displaying that kind of shift at every question which was better calculated for a bruising stage than a court of justice.

The evidence of this man cast a startling light upon the connection which was known to exist between the keepers of certain low-class houses of refreshment

and the highwaymen whom they on occasions sheltered and assisted. Some of the latter, however, relied upon themselves alone, and, leading double lives, would ostensibly follow some respectable calling in the intervals of adventure on the road.

Such a one was the individual who kept a glove shop on the northern outskirts of London. Though a cunning rascal, he was once thoroughly frightened by a lady.

Going out of town towards Barnet, she found that she had forgotten her gloves, and so stopped at this man's shop and bought a pair, and after paying for them from a purse well stocked with bank-notes, stepped into her post-chaise and proceeded on her journey.

She had scarcely reached Finchley Common, when a highwayman stopped the chaise and demanded her money. He entreated her not to be alarmed, he had no intention of hurting her; if she surrendered her property it was all he wanted. Penury alone urged him to the desperate act, and he was determined to obtain money or perish. The lady gave her and the depredator rode off.

purse,

After he was gone, and the fright had subsided, the lady imagined that in the address of the highwayman she recognised the voice of the glover she had some time before dealt with. This idea struck her so forcibly that she ordered the post-boy to drive back to town, not choosing, as she said, to venture farther over the Heath.

On her arrival at the glover's, she knocked and

gained admittance; the glover himself opened the door. The lady desired to speak with him in private. The glover showed her to a back parlour, when she exclaimed, "I am come for my purse, which you have robbed me of this evening on Finchley Common ! The glover was confounded. The lady proceeded, "It is of no use for you to deny it; I am convinced, and your life is at my mercy. Return me my property, and trust to my humanity!" The glover, overcome with guilt, shame, and confusion, returned the purse, confessed his crime, and pleaded his distress.

The lady, after a suitable admonishment, gave him a ten-pound note, bade him mend his way of life, and keep his own counsel, adding that she would never divulge his name or place of abode. She kept her word; and though the robbery was spoken of in the papers, no allusion was made to the discovery of the thief.

As a matter of fact, ladies often gave more trouble to highwaymen than did men thoroughly able to defend themselves.

Two well-known prize fighters, John Ward and William Treble, on their way to town in a chaise, were one night stopped by a single highwayman, who demanded their money; and notwithstanding Ward telling him to whom he was talking, still persisted in his demand, saying he paid no respect to personages, and obliged the two mighty heroes to deliver the contents of their pockets, which amounted, on the part of Ward, to half a crown and some halfpence, and on that of Treble, to one guinea