Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/340

332 proper distance; but they pelted me with clods, which I sometimes returned, till at last, after chasing me above a mile, they saw a party of troopers in red, passing by, at some distance; and then they gave over their pursuit.

The troopers observing my friend galloping and pursued, imagined he was some fanatick preacher, till they came to an old woman on a hill, whom my friend had desired to deny his being gone that way; upon which they went off to their quarters, and he got safe to Poddishaw's, whither I soon after arrived. The laird of Poddishaw had been that day at church; from whence, returning with the laird of Pocammock, who lived about a mile off, they both wondered how the horse got thither: for Pocammock was the owner of the horse, and his lady had rode on it that day to the conventicle, without her husband's knowledge, having been seduced thither by some fanatick neighbours, for she had never been at their meetings before. My friend and I acquainted the two lairds of the whole adventure of that day: and after dinner, Pocammock requested to let him have the horse home, thereby to stifle any reflection his lady might bring upon him, or herself, by going to a conventicle; he likewise invited us to dine next day at his house, where the horse should again be delivered to me, as justly forfeited by the folly of his wife. We went accordingly with the laird of Poddishaw, and dined at Pocammock's: where the horse was ordered to be led out into the court, in the same accoutrements as I found him the day before: but observing the lady in tears, I told her, that if she would give me her promise never to go to a conventicle again, I would bestow her the horse, and conceal what had passed; she readily