Thus began and thus ended the informing trade in these parts of the
county of Bucks; the ill success these first informers found
discouraging all others, how vile soever, from attempting the like
enterprise there ever after. And though it cost some money to carry
on the prosecution, and some pains too, yet for every shilling so
spent a pound probably might be saved of what in all likelihood
would have been lost by the spoil and havoc that might have been
made by distresses taken on their informations.
But so angry was the convicting Justice, whatever others of the same
rank were, at this prosecution, and the loss thereby of the service
of those honest men, the perjured informers--for, as I heard an
attorney (one Hitchcock, of Aylesbury, who was their advocate in
court) say, "A great lord, a peer of the realm, called them so in a
letter directed to him; whereby he recommended to him the care and
defence of them and their cause"--that he prevailed to have the oath
of allegiance tendered in court to Thomas Zachary, which he knew he
would not take because he could not take any oath at all; by which
snare he was kept in prison a long time after, and, so far as I
remember, until a general pardon released him.
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