'But not by violence.' 'Not in the least, ma'am,' I replied.

'The simplest thing in life.

We are in a civilised country; the man's a malefactor--' 'O, never!' she cried.

'Do not even dream it! With all his faults, I know he is not _that_.' 'Anyway, he's in the wrong in this affair--on the wrong side of the law, call it what you please,' said I; and with that, our four horsemen having for the moment headed us by a considerable interval, I hailed my post-boy and inquired who was the nearest magistrate and where he lived.
Archdeacon Clitheroe, he told me, a prodigious dignitary, and one who lived but a lane or two back, and at the distance of only a mile or two out of the direct road.

I showed him the king's medallion.
'Take the lady there, and at full gallop,' I cried.
'Right, sir! Mind yourself,' says the postillion.
And before I could have thought it possible, he had turned the carriage to the rightabout and we were galloping south.
Our outriders were quick to remark and imitate the manoeuvre, and came flying after us with a vast deal of indiscriminate shouting; so that the fine, sober picture of a carriage and escort, that we had presented but a moment back, was transformed in the twinkling of an eye into the image of a noisy fox-chase.