A ladder had been placed
against the wall, the bars of a window on the second story had been
wrenched away with a ploughshare (which was left in the room), and
140_l._ of Lady Campden's money were stolen. The robber was never
discovered--a curious fact in a small and lonely village. The times,
however, were disturbed, and a wandering Cavalier or Roundhead soldier
may have 'cracked the crib.' Not many weeks later, Harrison's servant,
Perry, was heard crying for help in the garden. He showed a
'sheep-pick,' with a hacked handle, and declared that he had been set
upon by two men in white, with naked swords, and had defended himself
with his rustic tool. It is curious that Mr. John Paget, a writer of
great acuteness, and for many years police magistrate at Hammersmith,
says nothing of the robbery of 1659, and of Perry's crazy conduct in
the garden.[6] Perry's behaviour there, and his hysterical invention
of the two armed men in white, give the key to his character. The two
men in white were never traced of course, but, later, we meet three
men not less flagitious, and even more mysterious. They appear to have
been three 'men in buckram.
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