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CHAPTER V.
HAPPENING soon after the adventure at Drury-lane, to read an advertisement, stating that a meeting of the freeholders of the county of Middlesex would be convened on the 11th of November, at the Mermaid Tavern, Hackney, to consider of the expediency of petitioning the Throne on the subject of parliamentary reform, it struck me that I might find it worth while to attend this meeting, as it would probably attract a large concourse of people, and, as at such assemblies riots and much confusion frequently occurred, which afforded a favourable opportunity for plundering the pockets of the company. On the day appointed, I accordingly left town in one of the Hackney stages, and arriving at the Mermaid about one o'clock, found the sheriffs had just opened the business of the meeting, which was held in a large room commonly used as an assembly-room for dancing, and detached from the tavern itself. To my disappointment, however, there were not above three hundred persons collected, and the building being very
