Mornings at Bow Street — Page 244-258

A HAGGLING CUSTOMER.

A linen-draper was brought before the magistrate charged with having assaulted an Israelitish damsel--one Miss Rebecca Myers.

The fair Rebecca (fair for one of her nation, though evidently not much addicted to the use of soap) stated with many tears, and a faltering voice, that she went into the defendant's shop to purchase some trifling articles; and because she objected to the price of some of them, he knocked her down with a roll of calico!

When she said "knocked her down," she meant he gave her such a blow as _would_ have knocked her down if she had not stood firm; and not content with this, he jumped over the counter, and putting his great paws on her shoulders, he shook her till her head seemed ready to drop off at the top joint, and her brains were addled for an hour after.

The magistrate expressed his surprise that a _linendraper_ should treat a lady so boisterously; and asked him what he had to say for himself.

The linendraper--who, by the bye, had nothing at all linen-draperish in his appearance, but on the contrary had an aspect remarkably stern and solemn--replied, by stating many little vexations which he had suffered from Miss Rebecca--such, for instance, as ordering him to cut off a quantity of calico, and then refusing to have it--"haggling" customers, of her sort, were more trouble than a little; and enough to ruffle any man's temper; but as to what she had said about the knocking her down, and _all that_, it was a mere tissue of falsehoods.

The very head and front of his offending, was "_frisking_" the calico at her, and threatening to send for a constable when she became abusive--"for abusive she was"--said he--"very abusive, though she looks so demure now."

The magistrate said he did not understand the word _frisking_ as applied in this case, and ordered the ungallant linendraper to find bail for his appearance at the sessions.

STEALING EX-OFFICIO.

A sturdy, squalid little fellow, calling himself Timothy Blunt, was brought before the magistrate under the following circumstances:-- The landlord of a public-house in the neighbourhood of Temple Bar, deposed that the prisoner, Timothy Blunt, came into his house that morning, as he was busy serving his customers, and staring in his face for about a minute, addressed him with a--"I say, Mister!

--I werrily believes as that ere's a _counterband bandanny_ as you've got round your neck--and as I'm a _necksizeman_, I shall seize it!"

--And he instantly did so--to the utter dismay of mine host.

"Show me your authority!"

cried the almost strangled landlord; but he cried in vain--Timothy Blunt scorned to parley; and tearing off the bandanna, he was walking away with it in triumph, when mine host bethought himself "that it was a rummish sort of a _go_;" and, by the assistance of his customers, gave Timothy Blunt in charge to a constable.

Timothy Blunt, in his defence, assured their worships that he was "a real _bony fidy_ excise officer; and that things were gotten to sich a pitch throughout the nation in the smuggling of _bandannies_, that he and his brother _off'sirs_ had strict orders to seize them wheresoever they lighted upon them--whether in pocket or on neck."

"Let me see your authority," said the magistrate.

"I knows of no law to obleege me to show it," said the sententious Timothy.

--"I seizes the bandannies for the king and his _revenny_, and if I'm wrong, why let the king look to it.

Besides, that ere authority cost me a matter of five pounds nineteen shillings; and I should be a fool to put it in _jipperdy_ by showing it to every man what asks for it!"

The magistrate immediately committed him to take his trial for _stealing_ the bandanna; but nevertheless he marched off to gaol upon excellent terms with himself.

A DISTRESSED FATHER.

Henry Newberry, a lad, only thirteen years old, and _Edward Chidley_, aged seventeen, were full committed for trial, charged with stealing a silver tea-pot from the house of a gentleman, in Grosvenor Place.

There was nothing extraordinary in the circumstances of the robbery.

--Young Newberry was observed to go down into the area of the house, whilst his companion kept watch, and they were caught endeavouring to conceal the tea-pot under some rubbish in the Five-fields, Chelsea; but the case was made peculiarly interesting by the unsophisticated distress of Newberry's father.

The poor old man, who it seems had been a soldier, and was at this time a journeyman paviour, refused at first to believe that his son had committed the crime imputed to him, and was very clamorous against the witnesses;

but as their evidence proceeded, he himself appeared to become gradually convinced.

He listened with intense anxiety to the various details; and when they were finished, he fixed his eyes in silence, for a second or two, upon his son, and turning to the magistrate, with his eyes swimming in tears, he exclaimed-- "I have carried him many a score miles on my knapsack, your honour!"

[Illustration] There was something so deeply pathetic in the tone with which this fond reminiscence was uttered by the old soldier, that every person present, even the very gaoler himself, was affected by it.

"I have carried him many score miles on my knapsack, your honour," repeated the poor fellow, whilst he brushed away the tears from his cheek with his rough unwashed hand, "but it's all over now!

--He has _done_--and--so have I!"

The magistrate asked him something of his story.

He said he had formerly driven a stage-coach, in the north of Ireland, and had a small share in the proprietorship of the coach.

In this time of his prosperity he married a young woman with a little property, but he failed in business, and, after enduring many troubles, he enlisted as a private soldier in the 18th, or Royal Irish Regiment of Foot, and went on foreign service, taking with him his wife and four children--Henry (the prisoner) being his second son, and his "darling pride."

At the end of nine years he was discharged, in this country, without a pension, or a friend in the world; and coming to London, he, with some trouble, got employed as a paviour, by "the gentlemen who manage the streets at Mary-la-bonne."

"Two years ago, your honour," he continued, "my poor wife was wearied out with the world, and she deceased from me, and I was left alone with the children; and every night after I had done work I washed their faces, and put them to bed, and washed their little bits o'things, and hanged them o' the line to dry, myself--for I'd no money, your honour, and so I could not have a housekeeper to do for them, you know.

But, your honour, I was as happy as I well could be, considering my wife was deceased from me, till some bad people came to live at the back of us; and they were always striving to get Henry amongst them, and I was terribly afraid something bad would come of it, as it was but poorly I could do for him; and so I'd made up my mind to take all my children to Ireland.

--If he had only held up another week, your honour, we should have gone, and he would have been saved.

But now!

----" [Illustration: A DISTRESSED FATHER.

] Here the poor man looked at his boy again, and wept; and when the magistrate endeavoured to console him by observing that his son would sail for Botany Bay, and probably do well there; he replied somewhat impatiently,--"Aye, it's fine talking, your worship; I pray to the great God he may never sail any where, unless he sails with _me_ to Ireland?"

and then, after a moment's thought, he asked, in the humblest tone imaginable, "Doesn't your honour think a little bit of a petition might help him?"

The magistrate replied, it possibly might; and added, "If you attend his trial at the Old Bailey, and plead for him as eloquently in word and action as you have done here, I think it would help him still more."

"Aye, but then _you_ won't be there, I suppose, will you?"

asked the poor fellow, with that familiarity which is in some degree sanctioned by extreme distress; and when his worship replied that he certainly should not be present, he immediately rejoined, "Then--what's the use of it!

There will be nobody there who knows _me_; and what _strangers_ will listen to a poor old broken-hearted fellow, who can't speak for crying?"

The prisoners were now removed from the bar to be conducted to prison, and his son, who had wept incessantly all the time, called wildly to him, "Father!

Father!"

as if he expected that his father could snatch him out of the iron grasp of the law.

But the old man remained rivetted, as it were, to the spot on which he stood with his eyes fixed on the lad until the door had closed upon him; and then putting on his hat, unconscious where he was, and crushing it down over his brows, he began wandering round the room in a state of stupor.

The officers in waiting reminded him that he should not wear his hat in the presence of the magistrate, and he instantly removed it; but he still seemed lost to every thing around him, and, though one or two gentlemen present put money into his bands, he heeded it not, but slowly sauntered out of the office, apparently reckless of every thing[29].

SORROWS OF THE SULLIVANS.

Mr. Daniel Sullivan, of Tottenham-court-road, green-grocer, fruiterer, coal and potato-merchant, salt fish and Irish pork-monger, was brought before the magistrate on a peace-warrant issued at the suit of his wife, Mrs. Mary Sullivan.

Mrs. Sullivan is an Englishwoman, who, according to her own account, married Mr. Sullivan for love, and has been "blessed with many children by him."

But nevertheless, she appeared before the magistrate with her face all scratched and bruised, from the eyes downward to the very tip of her chin; all which scratches and bruises, she said, were the handiwork of her husband.

The unfortunate Mary, it appeared, married Mr. Sullivan about seven years ago; at which time he was as polite a young Irishman as ever handled a potato on this side Channel;--he had every thing snug and comfortable about him, and his purse and his person taken together were quite _ondeniable_.

She, herself, was a young woman genteelly brought up--abounding in friends, and acquaintance, and silk gowns; with three good bonnets always in use, and black velvet shoes to correspond; welcome wherever she went, whether to dinner, tea, or supper, and made much of by everybody.

St. Giles's bells rang merrily at their wedding; a fine fat leg of mutton and capers, plenty of pickled salmon, three ample dishes of salt fish and potatoes, with pies, pudding, and porter of the best, were set forth for the bridal supper; all the most considerablest families in Dyott-street and Church-lane were invited, and everything promised a world of happiness--and, for five whole years, they were happy.

She loved--as Lord Byron would say, "She lov'd and was belov'd; she ador'd and she was worshipped;" but Mr. Sullivan was too much like the hero of his Lordship's tale--his affections could not "hold the bent;" and the sixth year had scarcely commenced when poor Mary discovered that she had "outlived his liking."

From that time to the present he had treated her continually with the greatest cruelty; and, at last, when by this means he had reduced her from a comely young person to a mere handful of a poor creature, he beat her, and turned her out of doors!

This was Mrs. Sullivan's story; and she told it with such pathos, that all who heard it pitied her--except her husband.

It was now Mr. Sullivan's turn to speak.

Whilst his wife was speaking, he had stood with his back towards her, his arms folded across his breast to keep down his choler, biting his lips, and staring at the blank wall; but, the moment she ceased, he abruptly turned round and, curiously enough, asked the magistrate whether _Misthress_ Sullivan had done _spaking_?

"She has," replied his worship; "but suppose you ask her whether she has anything more to say."

"I sholl, Sir!"

exclaimed the angry Mr. Sullivan.

--"Misthress Sullivan, had you any more of it to say?"

Mrs. Sullivan raised her eyes to the ceiling, clasped her hands together, and was silent.

"Very well, then," continued he--"will I get lave to spake, your honour?"

His honour nodded permission, and Mr. Sullivan immediately began a defence, to which it is impossible to do justice; so exuberantly did he suit the action to the word, and the word to the action.

"Och!

your honour, there is something the matter with me!"

he began; at the same time putting two of his fingers perpendicularly over his forehead to intimate that Mrs. Sullivan had played him false.

He then went into a long story about a "_Misther Burke_" who lodged in his house, and had taken the liberty of assisting him in his conjugal duties, "without any lave from _him_ at all."

It was one night in _partickler_, he said, that he himself went to bed betimes in the little back parlour, quite entirely sick with the head-ache.

_Misther_ Burke was out from home; and when the shop was shut up, Mrs. Sullivan went out too: but he didn't much care for that, _ounly_ he thought she might as well have staid at home, and so he couldn't go to sleep for thinking of it.

"Well, at one o'clock in the morning," he continued, lowering his voice into a sort of loud whisper;

"at one o'clock in the morning, Misther Burke lets himself in with the key that he had, and goes up to bed--and I thought nothing at all; but presently I hears something come, tap, tap, tap, at the street door.

The minute after, down comes Misther Burke, and opens the door, and sure it was Mary--Misthress Sullivan that _is_, more's the pity--and devil a bit she came to see after me in the little back parlour at all, but upstairs she goes after Misther Burke.

--'Och!'

says I, 'but there's something the mather with me this night!'

--and I got up with the night-cap o' th' head o' me, and went into the shop to see for a knife, but I couldn't get one by no manes.

So I creeps upstairs, step by step, step by step, (here Mr. Sullivan walked on tip-toe all across the office, to show the magistrate how quietly he went up the stairs,) and when I gets to the top, I sees 'em--by the _gash_ (gas) coming through the chink in the windy-curtains--I sees 'em; and 'Och!

Misthress Sullivan!'

says he; and 'Och!

Misther Burke!'

says she--and 'Och botheration!'

says I to myself, 'and what will I do now?'

" We cannot follow Mr. Sullivan any further in the _detail_ of his melancholy affair; it is sufficient that he saw enough to convince him that he was dishonoured; that by some accident or other, he disturbed the guilty pair, whereupon Mrs. Sullivan crept under Mr. Burke's bed, to hide herself; that Mr. Sullivan rushed into the room and dragged her from under the bed, by her "wicked leg;" and that he felt about the round table in the corner, where Mr. Burke kept his bread and cheese, in the hope of finding a _knife_.

"And what would you have done with it if you had found it?"

asked his worship.

"Is it what I would have done with it, your honour asks?"

exclaimed Mr. Sullivan, almost choked with rage--"Is it what I would have done with it!

--ounly that I'd have _dagged_ it into the heart of 'em at that same time!"

As he said this, he threw himself into an attitude of wild desperation, and made a tremendous lunge, as if in the very act of slaughter.

To make short of a long story, he did not find the knife, Mr. Burke barricadoed himself in his room, and Mr. Sullivan turned his wife out of doors.