The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures 78

The Choice Humorous Works, Ludicrous Adventures 78

"'Pray,' said I, with a degree of agitation which evidently

astonished my companion in the crape, 'where--in what part of the

Talbot at Ripley did the young lady die?'

 

"'In Number 3; that 'ere double-bedded room right over the gateway,'

said the man. 'We only packed her up this morning.'

 

"My dear Gurney, you may easily imagine what my feelings were. Only

conceive the idea of having been turned into a double-bedded room

in the dark with a dead woman! It was lucky that the horses were

pronounced ready, and that Major Barmingfield, whose residence at

Ripley mine hostess had so truly announced, made his appearance just

at the moment that the undertaker had enlightened me on the subject.

I felt a mingled sensation of horror at the event, of joy at my

escape from the place where it occurred, and of repentance for my

misconduct towards my landlady, who had so good-naturedly strained a

point for my accommodation, which nearly overset me; and I have not a

notion what I should have done, had it not been that the coldness of

the weather afforded me an excuse for drinking off a glass of brandy,

and the lateness of the hour forced me to mount my nag and begin my

canter to Wrigglesworth forthwith."

 

 

A VISIT TO THE OLD BAILEY.

 

As I entered the Court, a case of some importance had terminated,

and the judge just concluded his summing up, when the clerk of

the arraigns put the customary question to the jury, "How say ye,

gentlemen--is the prisoner at the bar guilty or not guilty?" Upon

which the jurymen laid their heads together, and I heard something

in a whisper from their foreman, who immediately pronounced the

agreeable verdict, "Not guilty." The prisoner bowed gracefully--he

was a pickpocket--and retired.

 

The prompt decision of the jury convinced me that it must have been

a clear case; and I rejoiced at the departure of the now exonerated

sufferer.

 

"That's a reg'lar rascal," said the sheriff to me in a whisper;

"never was such a case heard on, to be sure--seventeen watches,

thirty-two pocket handkerchiefs, four pair of spectacles, and five

snuff-boxes, all found upon his person!"

 

"Yet," said I, "the evidence could not have been very strong against

him--the jury acquitted him after a minute's consultation."

 

"Evidence, Mr. Gurney!" said the sheriff, "how little do you know of

the Old Bailey!--why, if these London juries were to wait to consider

evidence, we never should get through the business--the way we do

here is to make a zig-zag of it."

 

I did not exactly comprehend the term as it was now applied, although

Daly had often used it in my society with reference to a pin and a

card universally employed at the interesting game of _rouge et noir_;

and I therefore made no scruple of expressing my ignorance.

 

"Don't you understand, sir?" said the sheriff--"why, the next

prisoner will be found guilty--the last was acquitted--the one

after the next will be acquitted too--it comes alternate like--save

half, convict half--that's what we call a zig-zag; and taking the

haggregate, it comes to the same pint, and I think justice is done as

fair here as in any court in Christendom."

 

This explanation rendered the next prisoner who made his appearance

an object of considerable interest to me. He was a little dirty boy,

who stood charged with having stolen a pound of bacon and a peg-top

from a boy somewhat his junior. The young prosecutor produced a

witness, who, as far as appearances went, might, without any great

injustice, have taken the place of the prisoner, and who gave

his evidence with considerable fluency and flippancy. His manner

attracted the notice of one of the leading barristers of the court,

Mr. Flappertrap, who, in cross-examining him, inquired whether he

knew the nature of an oath.

 

"Yes, I does," said the boy.

 

"Explain it," said Flappertrap.

 

"You may be d----d," replied the lad; "that's a hoath, arn't it?"

 

"What does he say?" said the judge--who, as I about this period

discovered, was as deaf as a post.

 

"He says, 'You may be d----d,' my lord," said Flappertrap, who

appeared particularly glad of an opportunity to borrow a phrase,

which he might use for the occasion.

 

"What does he mean by that?" said the judge. That is the way, my

lord, he exhibits his knowledge of the nature of an oath."

 

"Pah! pah!" said the judge--"Boy, d'ye hear me?"

 

"Yes," said the boy, "I hears."

 

"Have you ever been to school?"

 

"Yes," said the boy, "in St. Giles's parish for three years."

 

"Do you know your catechism?"

 

The boy muttered something which was not audible to the court

generally, and was utterly lost upon the judge personally.

 

"What does he say?" said his lordship.

 

"Speak up, sir," said Mr. Flappertrap.

 

The boy muttered again, looking down and seeming embarrassed.

 

"Speak louder, sir," said another barrister, whose name I did not

know, but who was remarkable for a most unequivocal obliquity of

vision--"speak to his lordship--look at him--look as I do, sir."

 

"I can't," said the boy, "you squints!"

 

A laugh followed this bit of _naïvete_, which greatly abashed the

counsellor, and somewhat puzzled the judge.

 

"What does he say?" said his lordship.

 

"He says he knows his catechism, my lord."

 

"Oh--does not know his catechism--why then, what--"

 

"_Does_ know, my lord," whispered the lord mayor, who was in the

chair.

 

"Oh--ah--_does_ know--I know--here, boy," said his lordship, "you

know your catechism, do you?"

 

"Yes," replied he, sullenly.

 

"We'll see, then--what is your name?" said his lordship.

 

"My name," said the intelligent lad--"what, in the catechism?"

 

"Yes, what is your name?"

 

"M. or N. as the case may be," said the boy.

 

"Go down, go down," said the judge, angrily, and down he went.

 

"Gentlemen of the jury," said his lordship, "this case will require

very little of your attention--the only evidence against the prisoner

at the bar which goes to fasten the crime upon him, is that which

has been offered by the last witness, who evidently is ignorant of

the nature and obligation of an oath. With respect to the pig's toes

which the prisoner stands charged with stealing----"

 

"A peg-top, my lord!" said Flappertrap, standing up, turning round,

and speaking over the bench into the judge's ears.

 

"Peg-top," said his lordship--"oh--ah--I see--very bad pen--it looks

in my notes like pig's toes. Well--peg-top--of the peg-top which

it is alleged he took from the prosecutor, there has not been one

syllable mentioned by the prosecutor himself; nor do I see that the

charge of taking the bacon is by any means proved. There is no point

for me to direct your attention to, and you will say whether the

prisoner at the bar is guilty or not; and a very trumpery case it is

altogether, that I must admit."

 

His lordship ceased, and the jury again laid their heads together;

again the foreman gave the little "hem" of conscious readiness for

decision; again did the clerk of the arraigns ask the important

question, "How say ye, gentlemen, is the prisoner at the bar guilty

or not guilty?" "Guilty," said the foreman to the clerk of the

arraigns; and "I told you so," said the sheriff to me.

 

The next case was a short one. The prisoner a woman, the evidence

clear and straightforward; but no great interest was excited, because

it was known that the case, for the trial of which in point of fact

the learned judge had, for particular reasons, given his attendance,

and which accounted for his lordship's presence at the close of the

session, was very speedily to come on. This extraordinary combination

of circumstances afforded me the most favourable opportunity of

seeing all the sights of this half awful, half amusing scene, even to

the discharge of the grand jury, who had been specially kept together

for the purpose of finding or ignoring the bill preferred against

the eminent culprit, who was evidently the great attraction of the

day--having found which, they had but three more to decide upon.

 

It was in the middle of the defence of the female prisoner, now

"_coram nobis_," and just as she was making a beautiful but useless

appeal to the "gentlemen of the jury," that a bustle in the court

announced some coming event.

 

"I am," said the weeping prisoner, "an orphan--I lost my mother while

I was yet a child--my father married again, and I was driven from

what had been before a happy home--I have only to pray----"

 

Bang went a door--the scuffle of feet were heard--down went

some benches--"Make way--make way!" cried some of the officers.

"Stand back, sir, stand back--the gentlemen of the grand jury are

coming into court." To what the moaning prisoner at the bar might

have limited her supplications, I never had an opportunity of

ascertaining, for the noise I have mentioned was succeeded by the

appearance of eighteen or nineteen men, dressed up in something like

the shabbiest dominoes I had seen at Lady Wolverhampton's masquerade,

trimmed with very dirty fur--the leader, or foreman, carrying in

his hand three bits of parchment. As these gentlemen advanced to

a space reserved for them in the centre of the court, the judge

kept exchanging bows with them until they had all reached their

destination--the foreman then delivered to the clerk of arraigns

the three bits of parchment, who, putting his glasses on his nose,

read--James Hickson, larceny--not found.--John Hogg, felony--true

bill.--Mary Ann Hodges, felony--not found. The clerk then informed

his lordship, partly by words, and partly by signs, the result of the

deliberations of the grand jury, and the fact that there were no more

bills to set before them. Having thus far proceeded, that officer

inquired if the gentlemen of the grand jury had any presentment to

make; whereupon the foreman, one of the largest and dirtiest-looking

persons imaginable, but whose countenance was indicative of love of power and command, and who appeared, at the moment he prepared himself to unburthen his great soul of a grievance, to feel as if the whole world were a football, made for him to play with,--