At any rate he had been much abroad, and
spoke French well, of itself a suspicious circumstance to the bigoted
nationality of those days. Altogether he was an unpopular man, even
before he took the last step of employing shears, instead of hands, to
dress his wool. He was quite aware of his unpopularity, and of the
probable consequences. He had his mill prepared for an assault. He took
up his lodgings in it; and the doors were strongly barricaded at night.
On every step of the stairs there was placed a roller, spiked with barbed
points all round, so as to impede the ascent of the rioters, if they
succeeded in forcing the doors.
On the night of Saturday the 11th of April, 1812, the assault was made.
Some hundreds of starving cloth-dressers assembled in the very field near
Kirklees that sloped down from the house which Miss W--- afterwards
inhabited, and were armed by their leaders with pistols, hatchets, and
bludgeons, many of which had been extorted by the nightly bands that
prowled about the country, from such inhabitants of lonely houses as had
provided themselves with these means of self-defence. The silent sullen
multitude marched in the dead of that spring-night to Rawfolds, and
giving tongue with a great shout, roused Mr. Cartwright up to the
knowledge that the long-expected attack was come.
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