I recollect one young fellow--a tinker, I suppose, from his wallet and brazier--who had a woman with him, and who faced about and stared at me thus; and then roared to me in such a tremendous voice to come back, that I halted and looked round.
'Come here, when you're called,' said the tinker, 'or I'll rip your young body open.' I thought it best to go back.

As I drew nearer to them, trying to propitiate the tinker by my looks, I observed that the woman had a black eye.
'Where are you going ?' said the tinker, gripping the bosom of my shirt with his blackened hand.
'I am going to Dover,' I said.
'Where do you come from ?' asked the tinker, giving his hand another turn in my shirt, to hold me more securely.
'I come from London,' I said.
'What lay are you upon ?' asked the tinker.

'Are you a prig ?' 'N-no,' I said.
'Ain't you, by G--?
If you make a brag of your honesty to me,' said the tinker, 'I'll knock your brains out.' With his disengaged hand he made a menace of striking me, and then looked at me from head to foot.
'Have you got the price of a pint of beer about you ?' said the tinker.
'If you have, out with it, afore I take it away!' I should certainly have produced it, but that I met the woman's look, and saw her very slightly shake her head, and form 'No!' with her lips.
'I am very poor,' I said, attempting to smile, 'and have got no money.' 'Why, what do you mean ?' said the tinker, looking so sternly at me, that I almost feared he saw the money in my pocket.
'Sir!' I stammered.
'What do you mean,' said the tinker, 'by wearing my brother's silk handkerchief! Give it over here!' And he had mine off my neck in a moment, and tossed it to the woman.
The woman burst into a fit of laughter, as if she thought this a joke, and tossed it back to me, nodded once, as slightly as before, and made the word 'Go!' with her lips.

Before I could obey, however, the tinker seized the handkerchief out of my hand with a roughness that threw me away like a feather, and putting it loosely round his own neck, turned upon the woman with an oath, and knocked her down.

I never shall forget seeing her fall backward on the hard road, and lie there with her bonnet tumbled off, and her hair all whitened in the dust; nor, when I looked back from a distance, seeing her sitting on the pathway, which was a bank by the roadside, wiping the blood from her face with a corner of her shawl, while he went on ahead.
This adventure frightened me so, that, afterwards, when I saw any of these people coming, I turned back until I could find a hiding-place, where I remained until they had gone out of sight; which happened so often, that I was very seriously delayed.