call for such costly liquor, they viewed me very attentively, but more especially the Cabinet, which caused them to suspect me. The Master of the house was acquainted herewith, who as the Devil would have it was a Puritan, & a Constable too, officious and severe. Without craving pardon for his bold intrusion, he desired me I would admit him into my Boy-ships society. I confess his gray hairs and sower countenance made me at first sight, very much fear what the event of his visit would prove. However with a seeming undauntedness I drank to him, but what a difference of taste there was in that and the first glass I drank _Solus_: at length he came to ask me divers questions, _Whence I came?_ _Whither I was going?_ _What was contained within that Cascanet?_ and the like. Before I could give the resolution of what they demanded, the _Hue and Cry_ overtook me: presently I was laid hold on, and my treasure taken from me: that which vext me as much as my Surprizal was, I had no further time to try what kind of taste the Sack had. Various were the talk of the people, every one spending his Verdict on me. _This is a prime young rogue indeed, to begin thus soon, _said one_, could he have seen, when in his Mothers belly, surely he would have stoln something thence. _Another said_, Forward fruit was soon rotten, and since I began to steal whilst a child, I should be hanged before _I_ should write Man._ Ready to die with fear, I was sent back to the place whence I came and from thence to the place of execution, had not the tenderness of my age, and fewness of years procured pitty from my injur’d Master. Confin’d I was within his house, lockt up close Prisoner in a Chamber, till that he could acquaint my mother with what had past. In this time I was not debarred of my sustenance though my Commons were Epitomized, neither was I altogether deprived of society, for I was daily visited by my master attended with a Cat of Nine-tails (as he called it) being so many small cords, with which he fleyd my buttocks; and when he found me stubborn, or not penitent enough as he thought, after he had skinned my podex, he would wash it with vinegar, or water and salt. Within a week my Mother arrived, who hearing of my Rogueries, was so impatient, that she would needs take me to task her self; But when she had untrust me, and saw me in so woful a plight, my shirt being as stiff as Buckram with _blood_ and my tender breech ploughed and harrowed, fell down as if she had been about to expire: recovering my Master endeavour’d to satisfy her, by telling her that great offences required great punishments; and the way to bend an oak, is to do it whilst it is young, I had once when young (said he) a Spaniel which would find out the Hens nest, and breaking the eggs suck them, so that we could never have any Chickens, at last discovering who was the malefactor; I be thought my self of this punishment which should hinder him for ever doing the like. I got an egg