Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 18.djvu/107

Rh they said, "they always went out of course." The landlord promised to make up the complement by the appointed time, with honest lads, who would be glad to get their bellies full of drink, and a crown apiece, in an honest way. All was agreed upon; the gentleman paid the reckoning, which came to a considerable sum in beer and brandy for his mob, and departed, with assurance of being there at one o'clock to meet his myrmidons; but, the matter being discovered, he has not been heard of since, to the great disappointment of the good man and the people he had engaged. The like was done in several other parts of the town. They had secured to the number, as I told you, of one thousand persons, who were so hired to carry lights, though they knew not to what end, doubtless for a burial, among whom were many of the very foot guards. Drinking from one to five, it is plain they were to be made drunk, the better to qualify them for what mischief was designed by their proper leaders. The viceroy, with some others of as good and two or three of better rank than himself, were resolved to act in disguise; the viceroy like a seaman, in which he hoped to outdo Massaniello of Naples, whose fame he very much envies for the mighty mischief he occasioned. His busy head was the first inventor of the design; and he would take it very ill if he were robbed of the glory. He had lately proved the power of an accidental mob, and therefore hoped much better from a premeditated one: he did not doubt inflaming them to his wish by the noise of popery and the pretender, by which they would be put into a humour to burn even Dr. Sacheverell and the other effigies. At their several bonfires, where the parade was to make a Rh