He and his wicked companions became very busy in the practice of their employment.  They disturbed most of the roads near London, and were particularly good customers to Sadler’s Wells, Belsize,[67] and the rest of the little places of junketting and entertainment which are most frequented in the neighbourhood of this Metropolis.  Their method upon such occasions was to observe who was drunkest, and to watch such persons when they came out, suffering them to walk a little before them till they came to a proper place; then jostling them and picking a quarrel with them, they fell to fighting, and in conclusion picked their pockets, snatched their hats and wigs, or took any other methods that were the most likely to obtain something wherewith to support their riots in which they spent every night.

At last, finding their incomings not so large as they expected, they took next to housebreaking, in which they had found somewhat better luck.  But their expenses continuing still too large for even their numerous booties to supply them, they were continually pushed upon hazarding their lives, and hardly had any respite from the crimes they committed, which, as they grew numerous, made them the more known and consequently increased their danger, those who make it their business to apprehend such people having had intelligence of most of them, which is generally the first step in the road to Hyde Park Corner.[68]

It is remarkable that the observation which most of all shocks thieves, and convinces them at once both of the certainty and justice of a Providence is this, that the money which they amass by such unrighteous dealings never thrives with them; that though they thieve continually, they are, notwithstanding that, always in want, pressed on every side with fears and dangers, and never at liberty from the uneasy apprehensions of having incurred the displeasure of God, as well as run themselves into the punishments inflicted by the law.  To these general terrors there was added, to Little, the distracting fears of a discovery from the rash and impetuous tempers of his associates, who were continually defrauding one another in their shares of the booty, and then quarrelling, fighting, threatening, and what not, till Little sometimes at the expense of his own allotment, reconciled and put them in humour.

Nor were his fatal conjectures on this head without cause; for Bewle, though as Little always declared he had drawn him into such practices, put him into an information he made for the sake of procuring a pardon.  A few days after, Little was taken into custody, and at the next sessions indicted for breaking open the house of one Mr. Deer, and taking from thence several parcels of goods expressed in the indictment.  Upon this trial the prosecutor swore to the loss of his goods and Bewle, who had been a confederate in the robbery, gave testimony as to the manner in which they were taken.  As he was conscious of his guilt,