STEPHEN BUNCE.
In the plain but strong phrase, this man was born a thief. Scarcely could his hand carry away the property of others, when he engaged in this nefarious trade. While yet a child, he was frequently amusing himself with the children of a charcoal man who lived in the neighborhood, and would even then fill his pockets with the charcoal, and sell it to a woman that kept an apple-stall for codlings. One day he wished to try his ingenuity upon the good woman, and requested to have some codlings beforehand, promising to pay them with his next charcoal. But though she could purchase from him that which she knew he had stolen, yet she was not disposed to give him any credit.
Stephen was highly enraged that his fidelity should be called in question by the old woman, and determined upon revenge; so stealing a larger quantity of charcoal than usual, he filled the empty parts with powder, and sealed them with black wax. The old woman kindled a fire of them, and it being a very cold frosty night, sat down before the fire in the usual manner, to warm her starving body. But scarcely had the heat begun to operate, when the powder catching fire, off flew the kettle from the grate, the codlings and the water sprang about the old woman’s ears, and, in the midst of fire and smoke, she cried out in the most piteous manner, which brought a great mob about her to assist her in the hour of misfortune and distress. Fortunately, however, the chief injury that the old woman received was a hole burnt in her gown, a scalding to her chin, and the trouble of picking up her codlings.
But Stephen was not long to remain in correspondence with apple wives and such low gentry. Arrived at the years of a stripling, he went into a coffee-house, and called for a dish of tea. Meanwhile, rustling among the newspapers, he picked up the lid of a silver box, and paying for his tea, went and instantly got his own initials engraven upon it. Then, with the greatest assurance, he went back, saying, “Gentlemen, have not I left the bottom of my tobacco-box?” Thereupon rummaging among the papers, he found it, exclaiming, as he put the lid on, “Oh, here it is!” Upon this the owner claimed it as his property, but Stephen impudently showing his cipher upon it, claimed and retained it as his own.
At one time Bunce was benighted at Branyard in Hertfordshire, and being destitute of money, was at infinite loss how to proceed. But a fertile invention is a necessary qualification in a deceiver, and Stephen’s was acquiring considerable strength. He called at the parson’s door, and requested the maid to tell her master that a stranger wished to have the honor of speaking with him. When the clergyman made his appearance, Stephen, in an eloquent and affecting tone, informedhim that he was a poor student from Oxford, going home to his friends, and as he was benighted, he entreated that he would afford him the friendly aid of his roof for one night. The generous-hearted parson, pleased with his appearance and pitying his distress, kindly received him and entertained him according to the best of his household.
When Stephen was taking his leave for the night, he, with no small degree of modesty and respect, requested that he might be permitted to give the parson a sermon in the morning, the next day being Sunday. As, in general, no clergyman has any great objection to a day of rest, the parson willingly accepted of his offered services. The morning came, and the hour of divine service being arrived, the young student was equipped in the parson’s gown and cassock, and as it was about a mile to the church, he was mounted on the parson’s horse, while the latter, with his wife and family, went a nearer path through the fields. When his reverence came to the church, every one was scraping and bowing, and inquiring why he was without his canonical robes on the day of sacred duty. He soon relieved their anxiety, by informing them that a young gentleman of the university of Oxford would be there presently, and would preach for him that day. They waited for some time, then commenced divine service; the prayers were now ended, and the last psalm sung, but no preacher appeared. In short, not to detain our readers with a long narrative, they waited until noon,—the congregation went home without a sermon,—and the parson without his robes and horse, while Bunce was by this time far advanced on his journey, employing the horse to carry a thief instead of a clergyman.
Upon another day, as Stephen was going about seeking whom he might render lighter on their journey, he saw a gentleman well mounted upon a gelding, and going into the road along where he was to ride, he laid himself all along the ground, with his ear to it. When the gentleman came up to him, he asked the reason ofsuch unusual conduct. Stephen held up his hand to him, signifying his desire that he should be silent; but the gentleman, being of a hasty temper, cried, “What the plague are you listening to?” Upon this Stephen sat up, saying, “Oh, dear sir, I have often heard great talk of the fairies, but I could never have the faith to believe that there was ever any such thing in nature, till now, in this very place, I hear such a ravishing and melodious harmony of all kinds of music, that it is enough to charm me to sit here, if possible, to all eternity.”
Curiosity, that active principle in the human mind, inclined the gentleman to alight from his horse to hear the enchanting music. Having reached the ground, he gave his gelding to Stephen to hold during his interview with the fairies. Then, applying his ear to the ground, he said, “I can hear nothing.” Bunce desired him to turn the other ear. This being done, and his face averted from him, Bunce leaped into his saddle, and rode off with his gelding at full speed, until he came to Romford. Supposing that the owner would have some particular inn where he put up his horse, and therefore that the horse would know that place, he went after the horse at a small distance.
He no sooner appeared than the ostler, who was standing at the door, exclaimed, “Master! master! here’sMr.Bartlet’s horse come without him.” Stephen, having discovered the name of the owner of the gelding, said to the innkeeper, “Mr.Bartlet being engaged with some gentlemen at play in Ingatestone, he requests you to send him fifteen guineas, and to keep his horse in pledge in the mean time, until he comes himself in the evening.” “Ay, ay,” replied the innkeeper, “a hundred guineas, if he stood in need of them.” So Bunce, having received the fifteen guineas, prosecuted his journey to London. In a few hours,Mr.Bartlet came puffing and blowing, and covered with perspiration and dust. The innkeeper accosted him, saying, “Oh! dear sir, why need you have sent your gelding, and so put yourself to the trouble ofcoming in this sultry weather on foot, for the small sum of fifteen guineas, when you might have commanded ten times as much without a pledge?”—“What!” cried the gentleman, “has the fellow, then, brought my gelding hither? A villain! he was pretty honest in that; but I find the rogue has made me pay fifteen guineas for hearing one tune of the fairies.”
Bunce was an industrious man, and frequented the billiard-tables, the cockpits, and every place where he thought that a penny would come in his way. Though his funds often afforded him the means of reformation, he naturally hated virtue and honesty; he, therefore, with redoubled keenness, pursued his depredations. Once, upon foot, he met with a butcher between Paddington and London, who, being a strong, lusty fellow, was not disposed to give his contribution to Bunce without an exchange of blows. The cudgelling commenced, and, though the butcher acted his part well, yet Bunce was victorious. The conqueror, on searching for his spoil, found the immense sum of fourpence in his pockets. “Is this all you have got?” “And too much to lose,” said the butcher. “You villain!” cried Bunce, “if you’d fight at this rate for a groat, what a plague would you have done if you’d had more money?”
This was rather an unfortunate adventure, to have lost so much time and given so many blows for so little; but, returning home, he observed a goldsmith, who was a far richer prize than a butcher, telling a large sum of money in his shop. His eyes instantly sparkled, and his invention awoke. He went into an old shop in the vicinity, and purchased one farthing’s worth of salt. Then, hastening into the goldsmith’s shop, he threw the whole in his eyes; so that while he was rubbing his peepers, and stamping with rage, Bunce went off with about fifty pounds—a tolerable return for the outlay of a farthing.
It is an old proverb, “Lightly come, lightly go.” The same evening, having gone to recreate himself in the company of certain females, he was robbed oftwenty pounds, when, in the most furious manner, though to no purpose, he vented his imprecations against all the sex, asserting, that “every woman was a crocodile at ten, a fury at thirty, and a witch at four-score.”
Under the influence of vexatious disappointment, Bunce soon spent the remainder of his fifty pounds, and stern necessity again impelled him to action. Along with one of his trusty companions, he went into a wollen-draper’s shop, just as the good man was about to shut up; and, while he was cheapening a remnant of cloth, his companion stole the key of the shop from its usual resting place; upon which they both went off without making a purchase. Favored by the darkness of the night, they returned, and, without interruption or difficulty, extracted from the shop cloth to the amount of eighty pounds.
Bunce having been afterwards, by an order of the court, sent a soldier into Spain, while there, he and his comrades were one day in great want of victuals, and, having loitered all day about the market-place of Barcelona without finding any thing to remove their hunger, they discovered, in the evening, a countryman returning home on an ass. They followed him, and, having to ascend a steep hill, he alighted and led the ass. Bunce, with his companion, slipped quietly forward, and dexterously removing the bridle from the ass’s head to his own, his comrade went off with the ass, and Bunce trudged after the man upon all-fours. Arrived at the top of the hill, he looked around, and, to his great consternation and amazement, saw his ass transformed into a man.
Stephen, observing his surprise, said, “Dear master, don’t be troubled at this strange alteration that you see in your beast; for, indeed, I was no ass, as you supposed me, but a man, real flesh and blood, as you yourself are: but you must know, that it being my misfortune to commit a sin against the Virgin Mary, she resented it so heinously, that she transformed me into the likeness of an ass for seven years; and now,the time being expired, I resume my proper shape again, and am at my own disposal. However, sir, I return you many thanks for your goodness towards me; for since I have been in your custody, you have put me to no more labor than what I, you, or any other ass, might be able to bear.”
The countryman was greatly surprised at the relation, but was well satisfied, on receiving the grateful thanks of his former ass for the kind treatment he had given him during the period of his degradation. Stephen returned to his comrade, who had made the ass undergo another transmigration into money, so that these two hungry sharks hastened to set their teeth at work, lest they should lose the power of action by long disuse. Meanwhile, the countryman returned to town to purchase another ass to carry him home. But, to his astonishment, the first thing he met with was his own individual ass. Stepping up to the animal, he said, “Oh! I see that you have committed another sin against the Virgin Mary, but I shall take care how I buy you again.”
Bunce was married to a victualler’s daughter in Plymouth, and for some time lived with her with tolerable regularity, making the table roar, and the bowl to foam, and entertaining all the merry beaux of the town, until one of the tars offended Bunce by his politeness. Upon this, he left his young wife, and plunged into all those scenes of debauchery which are the usual attendants of the acquisition of money by unlawful means. In the progress of time his manners became so abandoned and profligate, and his conversation so loose, that he was the abhorrence of all decent persons, and a disgrace to human nature. He was at last detected in his wickedness, and suffered at Tyburn in the year 1707, in company with Dick Low and Jack Hall, whose histories are not of sufficient interest to warrant their insertion in these pages.