Smiling at the simplicity of the poor idiot, Gashford betook himself to
Welbeck Street by a different path from that which he knew the rioters
would take, and sitting down behind a curtain in one of the upper
windows of Lord George Gordon's house, waited impatiently for their
coming. They were so long, that although he knew it had been settled
they should come that way, he had a misgiving they must have changed
their plans and taken some other route. But at length the roar of voices
was heard in the neighbouring fields, and soon afterwards they came
thronging past, in a great body.
However, they were not all, nor nearly all, in one body, but were, as he
soon found, divided into four parties, each of which stopped before the
house to give three cheers, and then went on; the leaders crying out in
what direction they were going, and calling on the spectators to join
them. The first detachment, carrying, by way of banners, some relics
of the havoc they had made in Moorfields, proclaimed that they were on
their way to Chelsea, whence they would return in the same order, to
make of the spoil they bore, a great bonfire, near at hand. The second
gave out that they were bound for Wapping, to destroy a chapel; the
third, that their place of destination was East Smithfield, and their
object the same.
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