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In such a coarse of life, it is not likely that I could submit to limited hours; my companion and I seldom returned home before midnight, and sometimes not till the ensuing morning. Though we took measures to keep this from the ears of our employers, it could not fail to be known in time; and the consequence was, a strong but tender remonstrance on my impudence, which much affected me at the moment; but the impression was transitory, and soon effaced. I plunged deeper and deeper in the vortex of folly and dissipation, until I Was obliged to have recourse for advice to the Æsculapius of Gilead-house.
This irregular mode of life had borne hard on my finances, but I had not, as yet, had recourse to fraud or peculation. I was liberally supplied by my relations, on leaving S——, and had received my first quarterly allowance; but an event, which soon followed, tempted me to the first breach of confidence and integrity.
I had in my youth been passionately fond of Cocking, a sport for which the county of S—— has been always famed; and though so young, I had constantly kept several cocks at walk, unknown to my parents; so that I had acquired a considerable share of experience and knowledge on the subject. One day, when I was sent with some muslins to wait on a lady in the environs of Liverpool, near the Canal, I accidentally passed a cock-pit, where a
