12
justice, who was the terror and the professed enemy of the gypsies, yet he so well managed the affair, that in a long examination he made him believe he was an honest miller, whose house, mill, and substance had been consumed by fire, occasioned by the negligence of the 'prentice. and accordingly got a bountiful sum for his relief, the justice not in the least suspecting a defraud.
He had such a wonderful facility in every character he assumed that he even deceived those who thought themselves so well acquainted with him that it was impossible for him to impose on them.
Coming one day to ’Squire Portman’s house at Blandford, in the character of a rat catcher with a heir cap on his head, a buff girdle about his waist, a little box by his side, and a tame rat in his hand, he goes boldly up to the house where he had been well known before, and meeting the ’squire, person Bryant, and one Mr Pleydell of Milbourn and some other gentlemen, he asked them, if they had any rats to kill? Do you understand the business well, says the ’squire. Yes, an’ please your honour, I have been a rat-catcher many years, and have been employed in his Majesty’s yards and
