When I came downstairs, I found my cripple talking with my landlady; he was now out of his disguise, but we called him cripple still; and the other, who put on the woman’s clothes, we called Goody Thompson.  As soon as he saw me, he called me out, “Do you know,” says he, “the man of the house you are quartered in?” “No, not I,” says I.  “No; so I believe, nor they you,” says he; “if they did, the good wife would not have made you a posset, and fetched a white loaf for you.”  “What do you mean?” says I.  “Have you seen the man?” says he.  “Seen him,” says I; “yes, and heard him too; the man’s sick, and groans so heavily,” says I, “that I could not he upon the bed any longer for him.”  “Why, this is the poor man,” says he, “that you knocked down with your fork yesterday, and I have had all the story out yonder at the next door.”  I confess it grieved me to have been forced to treat one so roughly who was one of our friends, but to make some amends, we contrived to give the poor man his brother’s horse; and my cripple told him a formal story, that he believed the horse was taken away from the fellow by some of our men, and if he knew him again, if ’twas his friend’s horse, he should have him.  The man came down upon the news, and I caused six or seven horses, which were taken at the same time, to be shown him; he immediately chose the right; so I gave him the horse, and we pretended a great deal of sorrow for the man’s hurt, and that we had not knocked the fellow on the head as well as took away the horse.  The man was so overjoyed at the revenge he thought was taken on the fellow, that we heard him groan no more.

We ventured to stay all day at this town and the next night, and got guides to lead us to Blackstone Edge, a ridge of mountains which part this side of Yorkshire from Lancashire.  Early in the morning we marched, and kept our scouts very carefully out every way, who brought us no news for this day.  We kept on all night, and made our horses do penance for that little rest they had, and the next morning we passed the hills and got into Lancashire, to a town called Littlebrough, and from thence to Rochdale, a little market town.  And now we thought ourselves safe as to the pursuit of enemies from the side of York.  Our design was to get to Bolton, but all the county was full of the enemy in flying parties, and how to get to Bolton we knew not.  At last we resolved to send a messenger to Bolton; but he came back and told us he had with lurking and hiding tried all the ways that he thought possible, but to no purpose, for he could not get into the town.  We sent another, and he never returned, and some time after we understood he was taken by the enemy.  At last one got into the town, but brought us word they were tired out with constant alarms, had been strictly blocked up, and every day expected a siege, and therefore advised us either to go northward where Prince Rupert and the Lord Goring ranged at liberty, or to get over Warrington Bridge, and so secure our retreat to Chester.