Chapter I: Part 1

CHAMBERS’S JOURNAL

OF

POPULAR

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART

Fifth Series

ESTABLISHED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, 1832

CONDUCTED BY R. CHAMBERS (SECUNDUS)

NO. 22.—VOL. I. SATURDAY, MAY 31, 1884. PRICE 1½_d._]

OUR DETECTIVE POLICE.

The number of murders that have taken place, and the very few murderers that have been brought to justice in and about London during the last few months, must go far towards contradicting the assertion to the effect that the metropolis of England is ‘the safest city in the world’ to live in. And if to the list of crimes against life which have not been, and never are likely to be, brought home to the perpetrators, we add the innumerable thefts, burglaries, and other offences against property which go unpunished because the criminals are never found out, it can hardly be denied that we require a new departure in the system of our Detective Police, for the simple reason that, as at present constituted, the practical results of the same are very much the reverse of satisfactory.

It has been my lot, for reasons which need not be entered into here, to see not a little of the French detective system, and of the plans adopted by those employed in discovering crime in Paris. The two systems, those of the London and Parisian detective, differ most essentially. With us, it is as if the general commanding an army in the field was to send spies into the enemy’s camp, taking care they were dressed and behaved themselves in such a manner that every one would know who they were. On the other hand, the French system of detection is based on the principle that the enemy—namely, the criminals amongst whom they have to make their inquiries—should never be able to discover who the spies are. Now, with some fifty or sixty detectives trained to perfection in the art of disguising themselves, must it not be far more easy to discover the whereabouts of crime and the identity of the criminals, than can possibly be done under our system? Our detectives are as well known to a Londoner of any experience, and we may presume they are also just as well known to the criminal classes, as if they wore uniform. Nay, in a very useful volume called _The Police Code and Manual of the Criminal Law_, compiled by Mr Howard Vincent, it is clearly laid down that ‘the idea that a detective to be useful in a district must be unknown is erroneous in the great mass of cases, as he is then unable to distinguish between honest men who would help a known officer and others.’

It seems to me, as it must do to all who study the question, that this is the fundamental mistake we make, and that it is for this reason our detection of crime is so defective. We have no spies in the enemy’s camp. Our detective officers are merely policemen in shooting-jackets and billycock hats. The great criminal army knows who they are as well as if they wore their blue tunics. A French detective has nothing whatever to do with arresting criminals. He is not the sportsman who shoots the bird, but only the dog which points out where the game is to be found. The French agents of police, or detectives—many of whom have been over in England on business, and are well acquainted with our system—say that our regular police who keep order in the streets are the best guardians of peace and order in the world, but that our detective system is the worst and, practically, the most useless in Europe. Nor can any one acquainted with the subject say they are wrong. Even the most casual readers of the papers must be struck with two facts relating to crime in London. In the first place, the vigilance of the ordinary police is so great, that, as a rule, they lay hands upon a very great number of criminals, and cause a vast deal of crime to be punished. But, on the other hand, if a murderer, burglar, or other offender against society _does_ manage to get clean away, he is rarely if ever caught. The police—that is, of course, the detective police—invariably ‘get a clue’ to the affair; and there the matter seems to end. The detection of crime is evidently not an art that has been cultivated in England.

The French detective is a man who would never be thought, by any one who did not know him personally, to be connected with the police. In fact, he generally does his best to hide his real occupation from even his most intimate friends. Like our Londoner who is ‘something in the City,’ he assumes the indefinite appellation of _un employé du gouvernement_; but in what office he is ‘employed,’ or what his ‘employment’ may be, he refrains from stating. He is generally a quiet, unpretending individual, who neither courts nor avoids notice. The facility with which he assumes all kinds of disguise, and the admirable manner in which he acts the part he assumes, must be seen in order to be realised. As a rule, he takes some time before bringing his inquiries to a close; but he is rarely at fault in the long-run, and generally manages to bring down the game he is hunting.

Our English detective is the exact contrary of his French _confrère_. He does not wear uniform, but he might just as well do so, for his appearance and dress proclaim him to be what he is quite as plainly as if he was clad like X142 of the force. He is a well-meaning, intelligent fellow; but both his want of training and the system under which he has to work quite unfit him for the detection of any crime which is hidden in mystery. I remember, some years ago, being on a visit at a country-house, where the jewel-case of a lady visitor was stolen. It was quite safe when the owner had finished dressing for dinner; but a couple of hours later her maid missed it, and gave the alarm. Search was made—it is needless to say, in vain. The house was full of visitors, many of whom had brought with them their own valets and ladies’ maids, besides which there was a large staff of servants belonging to the house itself. A telegram was despatched to Scotland Yard the next morning; and in due time two detective officers arrived from London. They examined the room from which the jewel-box had been taken; questioned, and, as a natural consequence, set by the ears, all the servants of the house, as well as those of the different visitors; made inquiries at the neighbouring railway station about the travellers who had left the place during the last few days; and finally, took their departure, leaving matters exactly where they were—where they have remained to the present day, and where they are likely to remain for all time.

As a comparison with the foregoing, I may mention a case of a very similar kind which I once witnessed in Paris. A friend of mine, living with his wife, daughter, and a male and female servant _au second_ of a large old-fashioned house, found one morning that all his plate had been stolen. It was quite safe when the family went to bed the previous night; but in the morning it had vanished. He communicated with the police; and an elderly gentleman, who looked like the manager or one of the head-clerks of a bank, was sent to the house. Neither the _concierge_ nor any one else had the slightest idea who the individual was. He came ostensibly to see my friend on some business, and only told _him_ what this business really was. He came again the next day and the following four or five days, making his visits purposely when my friend and all his family were out, so as to have an excuse, whilst awaiting their return, of talking to the servants, or of wasting a quarter of an hour in the _concierge’s_ den. He managed to ingratiate himself with this latter individual; and in the course of the next few weeks, during which time he still paid occasional visits, ostensibly to my friend, became quite intimate with the servant. It ended in the _concierge_ being arrested one fine day on a charge of having stolen the plate. This was brought about partly by something the detective had seen in the _concierge’s_ room, but chiefly on account of what he had heard at a place where a number of the agents or brokers for stolen goods used to congregate for business, and to which the detective went in the character of a thief. The crime was thus discovered, and the thief was duly punished.

I mention these two cases, out of not a few with which I am acquainted, as illustrating in some measure the very different systems on which the detectives of England and France do their work. In the latter country, as in every other country in Europe, London is regarded by the dangerous classes as the happy hunting-ground of thieves and rogues of all kinds. I am fully aware that many Englishmen would regard the French detective mode of working as underhand and mean, and object to what they would term any underhand work of the kind. But surely when a question of such magnitude as the detection of crime is mooted, the authorities ought not to be guided by what is merely a matter of sentiment. Murderers, burglars, thieves, swindlers, and all other evil-doers, do not hesitate to use the most effectual means at their command in order to insure success to themselves. Why, then, should we do so? Crime of every kind is getting daily more and more clever and scientific in its working; why should we not avail ourselves of every possible advantage which the perpetrators of crime can command? One thing is very certain, that unless we take a new departure in the manner we attempt to detect crime, the dangerous classes will very soon have everything their own way. As a French police agent once told me, every crime that is undiscovered serves as an incentive for a dozen more of the same kind.

With respect to the very strong dislike which some persons have to anything in the shape of a secret police—or rather to disguised agents of the police acting as spies in the camp of the dangerous classes—it ought not to be forgotten that the same prejudice existed half a century ago against the ‘new police,’ or the ‘Peelers’ as they were called, being substituted for the watchmen or ‘Charlies’ of our grandfathers’ days. If the authorities are wise enough to constitute and maintain a really efficient system of secret police agents in the place of what we now call ‘plain-clothes officers,’ the result will be much the same as was the substitution of a regular metropolitan police in place of the old watchmen. But if this greatly called-for change is delayed much longer, we shall see the criminal classes gaining in strength every year, until it will become as difficult to get the mastery over them as is the case in some of the Western States in America. A secret police, or rather, a number of secret agents of the police, organised on the French system, is what we must institute ere long, and the sooner it is taken in hand the better. Those who require their services do not hesitate to employ ‘Private Inquiry Offices’ and other similar establishments; why should the government decline to entertain the idea of such an agency as is here advocated? If any man of influence and authority in the land could be present at a ‘business’ meeting of English, French, and a few German thieves in some of the lowest haunts of ‘Foreign London,’ an efficient system of secret detective police would very soon become established in what has been foolishly called ‘the safest city in the world.’

In England, we have a curious but very erroneous idea that if a policeman wears a suit of plain clothes instead of his regular uniform, he is fully able to find out all about any crime that has ever been committed. A greater mistake was never made. Not only to the ‘dangerous classes,’ but to almost every Londoner who is anything of an observer regarding his fellow-men, ‘plain-clothes’ officers, as our detectives are called, are actually as well known as if they wore the helmet, blue tunic, and black leather waist-belt of the regular policeman. It is quite otherwise in France. A French detective, as we have remarked before, has nothing whatever to do with serving summonses or warrants. He never arrests a criminal, but he points out to the regular police where criminals are to be found. It is only on very rare occasions that he even appears as witness against a prisoner; and when he does so, he assumes for the future a dress and general appearance quite unlike what he has hitherto borne. A French detective who cannot disguise himself in such a manner that his oldest friend would not be able to recognise him, is not deemed worth his salary. He takes the greatest professional pride in this art. In a word, the French detectives are the spies sent by the army of law and order to find out all about the enemy that is constantly waging war against life and property. In England, we have no similar set of men, and what are the consequences? Why, that unless a murderer, burglar, or other offender is either taken red-handed, or leaves behind him some very plain marks as to who he is or where he is to be found, crime with us is, as a rule, undetected. Sooner or later, notwithstanding our national prejudices against all that is secret and underhand, we must adopt a system for the detection of crime on the plan that is found to work so well in France; and the sooner we do so the better, unless we want to make England in general, and London in particular, more than even it is now the happy hunting-ground of all the scoundrels in Europe. All Frenchmen who have visited our country say that our _ordinary_ police is the very best in the world; that the manner in which they preserve order in the streets is above praise; and they are right. Nor can a word be said against the character, the integrity, or the intentions also of our detectives. But the system on which they are trained is essentially bad. They are the wrong men in the wrong place—the square pegs in the round holes.

BY MEAD AND STREAM.

CHAPTER XXX.—CURIOUS.

‘I am going to the village, Ada, to see Mr Beecham, but I shall not be long,’ said Wrentham to his wife.

She in her pale, delicate prettiness was as unlike the mate of such a man as Wrentham as a gazelle linked to a Bengal tiger would appear. But she was fond of him, believed in him, and was as happy in her married state as most of her neighbours seemed to be. Indeed, she believed herself to be a great deal happier than most of them. So far as the household arrangements were concerned, he was a model husband: he interfered with none of them. He seldom scolded: he accepted his chop or steak with equanimity whether it was over or under done (of course he did not think it necessary to mention the repasts he indulged in at the _Gog and Magog_); and he had even put on a pair of unbrushed boots without saying anything aloud. What woman is there who would not appreciate such a husband?

Mrs Wrentham did appreciate him, and was devoted to him. She had brought him a few hundreds, with which her father, a country tradesman, had dowered her, and of that Wrentham declared he was able to make a fortune. With that intent most of his time was occupied in the City; and she often lamented that poor Martin was so eager to make ‘hay whilst the sun shone’—as he called it—that he was working himself to death.

‘Never mind, dear,’ he would say: ‘there is no time like the present for laying by a store; and we shall have leisure to enjoy ourselves when we have made a comfortable little fortune.’

‘But if you should kill yourself in the meanwhile, Martin!’

‘Nonsense, Ada; I am too tough a chap to be killed so easily.’

Then he would go off gaily to the City (or the betting-ring). She would sigh, and sit down to wait for the happy time when that little fortune should be made.

The man whilst he spoke to her was sincere enough; but in the feverish excitement of his speculations he forgot all about wife and home.

At present he was at ease, for he did not mean to go farther than the _King’s Head_. So he made the little woman quite happy by his effusive tenderness, and still more by the information that she might wait up for his return. What pleasanter intimation could a loving wife receive?

The village was in darkness, for gas had not yet found its way into Kingshope. The feeble glint of a candle here and there looked like a dull glowworm striving to keep up a semblance of life. The half-dozen shops with their oil-lamps were a little brighter than the houses; but their innermost corners were dark and mysterious. Even the _King’s Head_ and _Cherry Tree_ wore such veils upon their faces that a stranger would have passed by without suspecting that these were hostelries within the gates of which was to be found good entertainment for man and beast, and where on market-days and fair-days were held high revels.

In one of the darkest parts of the street there was a little window illuminated by a single ‘dip:’ that ‘dip’ revealed a jumble of sweetmeats, cheap, gaudy toys, and penny picture-books. The eager eyes of a group of children discovered there a palace of wonder and delight, filled with objects of surpassing interest and ambition. There was a wooden sword which young Hodge regarded as more powerful than his father’s spade and pick-axe: there was a gilt gingerbread man with a cocked-hat, which was looked upon with breathless admiration as a correct model of the Prince of Wales in all the splendour of royal attire. There was a brief discussion as to whether the cocked-hat should not have been a gold crown, which was undoubtedly the proper headgear for a prince. This, however, was settled by a mite of a girl, who suggested that the cocked-hat was worn when the Prince went out for a walk, and the crown when he was in the palace.

Next in attractive power was a greenish bottle full of brandy-balls; and the children’s teeth watered as they gazed upon it. A Lord Mayor’s dinner must be a small thing compared with that window with its jumble of sweets and toys.

‘Wouldn’t you like to have some of these nice things? How happy we would be if life could be all gilt gingerbread and brandy-balls!’

That was exactly what they had been thinking, and an appalled silence fell upon the little group, as they turned to stare at the wizard who had read their desire through the backs of their heads. But they all knew the kindly face of the gentleman who was looking at them so pleasantly. They did not note the shade of sadness and pity that was in his eyes. The faces of the younger children broadened into smiles of expectation: the elder ones hung their heads a little—shy, doubting, hoping, and vaguely fearing that they had been caught doing something wrong.

Mr Beecham patted one of them on the head—a child of about six years.

‘Suppose you had sixpence, Totty, what would you do?’

‘Buy all the shop.’

‘And what then?’

‘Eat um,’ was the prompt and emphatic answer.

‘What! would you not share with your friends?’

Totty looked round at her friends, who were anxious about her next reply.

‘Such a lot of ’em,’ she said with a kind of sulky greediness.

‘Well, sixpence will not buy the whole shop; but I shall give it to your brother, and he must spend it upon something which can be easily divided into equal parts, so that you may all share alike.’

The gift was accepted in silence; but he had only moved a few paces away when there arose a hubbub of young voices angrily disputing as to what should be purchased with their fortune. He turned back and settled the matter for them. Whilst thus occupied, he was visited with the unpleasant reflection that what we want does not cause us so much trouble as what we possess. These children had been happy gazing at what they had no expectation of attaining. In imagination they could pick and choose each what he or she most fancied. Then he had come like an evil genius amongst them and by his trifling gift had produced discord. Had he purchased all that was in the shop there would still have been dissatisfaction.

‘Communism will never thrive,’ he muttered as he walked away, after pacifying his little protégés as best he could; ‘the selfish individual will always be too strong for it. Master Philip is making a mistake.’

‘He _is_ a rum chap,’ was the comment of Mr Wrentham, who had been watching the incident from the outside of the small semicircle of light cast from the window of the sweet-shop. ‘In his dotage?... No. I might have said that, if we had not spent a few evenings together. A man who can pick up Nap and play it as he did, is no fool, however much of a knave he may be. He is not that either.... Wonder what can be the reason of Hadleigh’s curiosity about him.’

His first movement from the darkness in which he stood suggested that he purposed saluting Mr Beecham at once; but he altered his mind, lit a cigar, and strolled leisurely after him. He had found a new interest in the stranger: it sprung out of his profound respect for Mr Hadleigh, for he was convinced that every word spoken by that gentleman, and certainly every act performed by him, was the result of careful reflection and shrewd foresight. He was not a man to do anything without a distinct view to his own advantage. Wrentham intended to share that advantage. But as he was at present unable to conceive what it might be, and was working entirely in the dark, with the hope merely that he should discover the meaning of it all as he proceeded, he considered it wise to move with caution whilst he maintained the bearing of a most willing servant.

He had been under the impression that he had sounded the depths of Mr Beecham’s character pretty correctly; but Mr Hadleigh’s inquiries and the incident with the children suggested two such opposite phases, that Wrentham could only conclude one of them must be wrong. Mr Hadleigh had started the suspicion that Beecham had some design in hand, the discovery of which would be useful: the scene with the children brought Wrentham back to his first impression—that he was a simple-minded but clear-sighted gentleman who was willing to lose a few pounds at cards occasionally without grumbling.

Mr Beecham had so few visitors in his village quarters, that he had not yet found it necessary to give the attendants at the _King’s Head_ the unpalatable but frequently unavoidable instruction to say ‘Not at home.’ So that, on Wrentham’s arrival, his name was at once conveyed to him. The message brought back was that, if Mr Wrentham would be good enough to wait for a few minutes, Mr Beecham would be ready to receive him.

When at length he was shown into the room, Mr Beecham was closing a large envelope, which he placed on his desk in order to shake hands with his visitor. At each side of the desk was a bright lamp with a white shade, reflecting the light full upon the document he had laid down. Wrentham had no difficulty in reading the address.

‘Hope I am not disturbing you. Got home early, and took it into my head to come down and have a cigar and a chat. If you’re busy, I’ll bolt.’

‘No necessity. I had only to address an envelope to a friend with some inclosures, and that is done. You are very welcome to-night, although we are not likely to have a chat, as I have invited some young people to a conjuring entertainment.’

‘I am afraid you will find me an ungracious guest,’ said Wrentham, laughing, ‘for I had made up my mind to have a quiet evening with you alone, and I have no fancy for jugglers—their tricks are all so stale.’

‘You will find this man particularly amusing. He is clever with his tongue as well as his hands, and is remarkably well-mannered, although you will be astonished, perhaps, to learn that he is only a street performer. I ought not to have told you that until after you had seen him. However, my chief pleasure will be—and I am sure yours will be—in seeing how the children enjoy the magician’s wonders. Mr Tuppit tells me that he never has so much delight in his work as when he has an audience of young people. We have got the large dining-room for the performance, and it is likely to turn out a brilliant affair. You must stay.’

At the mention of the conjurer’s name, Wrentham made a curious movement, as if he had dropped something—it was only the ash of his cigar which had fallen on his sleeve. He dusted it into the fender.

‘I wish I could go into things of this sort like you,’ he said, smiling admiringly at Mr Beecham’s enthusiasm; ‘but I can’t. I don’t believe you could do it either, if you had heavy and anxious work on hand. But you belong to the lucky ones who have successfully passed the Rubicon of life. You have made your hay, and can amuse yourself without thinking about to-morrow. I am never allowed to get to-morrow out of my head.’

‘Most people say that,’ was Mr Beecham’s response, with one of his quiet smiles; ‘and I always think it is because we waste to-day in thinking of to-morrow.’

‘Hit again,’ exclaimed Wrentham with a frank laugh. ‘I believe you are right; but we cannot all be philosophers. Nature has most to do in forming us, whatever share education may have in it. Where the dickens did you pick up your philosophy? In the east, west, north, or south? Have you been a traveller for pleasure or on business? Where have you been? What have you done, that you should be able always to see the sunny side of life? There’s a string of questions for you. Don’t trouble to answer them, although I should like if possible to learn how you became what you are—so calm, so happy.’

All this was spoken so good-humouredly—as if it were the outcome of nothing more than jesting curiosity—that Wrentham fancied he had very cleverly turned to useful account a passing observation. His host could not avoid giving him some direct information about his career now.

Mr Beecham appeared to be amused—nothing more.

‘I have travelled in many directions of the compass, partly on business, partly on pleasure. Everywhere I have found that although the scenes are different, men are the same. Those who have had a fortune made for them spend it, wisely or unwisely as may be; those who have not, strive or wish to strive to make one for themselves. Some succeed, some fail: but the conditions of happiness are the same in either case—those who are the most easily content are the most happy.’

‘Beaten,’ thought Wrentham. ‘What a clever beggar he is in answering the most direct questions with vague generalities.’ What he said was this:

‘I suppose that you had a fortune made for you, and so could take things easy?’

‘A little was left to me, but I am glad to say not enough to permit me to be idle. I cannot say that I have worked hard, but I worked in the right direction, and the result has been satisfactory—that is, so far as money is concerned.’

‘Wish you would give me a leaf out of your book: it might start me in the right direction too.’

‘Some day you shall have the whole book to read, Mr Wrentham, and I shall be delighted if you find it of service.’

‘But what line were you in? I should like to know.’

‘So you shall, so you shall—by-and-by.—You have allowed your cigar to go out. Try one of these Larranagas; and excuse me for a minute—I want to send this away.’

He took up the packet which Wrentham had observed lying on the desk, and quitted the room.

‘Wish I could make him out,’ was Wrentham’s reflection, as, after lighting his cigar, he stood on the hearth with his back to the fire and glared round the room in search of something that might help to satisfy his curiosity. ‘Maybe there is nothing to make out.... But what does he want sending off letters to Madge Heathcote at this time of evening? I saw the address plainly enough, and that letter was for her.... There _is_ something to find out.’

(_To be continued._)

THE ASHBURNHAM COLLECTIONS.

In 1763, Mr Grenville, then First Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer, had occasion to enlist the services of a gentleman familiar with ancient handwriting, in the arrangement of papers and other business. So well did Mr Thomas Astle do his work, that, two years later, he was made Receiver-general on the Civil List; subsequently becoming, in succession, chief clerk in the Record Office, and keeper of the records in the Tower. Astle was a diligent and discreet collector of manuscripts; and mindful of his obligations to the Grenvilles, directed by his will that his valuable library should pass into the possession of the Marquis of Buckingham for the sum of five hundred pounds. That nobleman gladly accepted the conditional bequest, and housed the sometime keeper’s treasures honourably at Stowe. As opportunities offered, he and his successor added books and documents to Astle’s store, until they had brought together a mass of original materials for the history of the three kingdoms unrivalled by any other private collection.

The middle of the present century saw Stowe shorn of its glories; and in 1849, its famous manuscripts were advertised for public sale; but their threatened dispersion was fortunately averted by the Earl of Ashburnham purchasing the entire collection, and adding it to his own extensive library, rich in works of early European and English literature. At the time of the earl’s death he was the possessor of four distinct collections, known as the Stowe, the Barrois, the Libri, and the Appendix. The last-named, representing his occasional purchases, consisted of two hundred and fifty volumes, including richly illuminated missals and Books of Hours, choice copies of the works of Chaucer, Wickliffe, Gower, Dante; English chronicles, monastic registers, and individual manuscripts of great rarity and value. The Barrois collection of seven hundred and two manuscripts was notable for its specimens of ancient bindings, its illuminated manuscripts, and its examples of early French literature; while the Libri section was remarkable for its very ancient manuscripts, its copies of Dante’s Commedia, its works of early Italian literature, its rare autographs, and its letters of distinguished French men of science.

In 1879, all these treasures were offered by the present Earl of Ashburnham to the trustees of the British Museum for the sum of one hundred and sixty thousand pounds; but upon their requesting him to separate the manuscripts from the printed books, the earl intimated that, finding he had underpriced his library in the first instance, he should require the hundred and sixty thousand pounds for the manuscripts alone; or fifty thousand for the Stowe collection, and fifty thousand for the Appendix collection, if the trustees elected to buy them only; and with that intimation the negotiation ended. In the autumn of 1882 the Museum authorities sought Lord Ashburnham again, to learn that he would only sell the collection as a whole at the price he had originally named. The keeper of the department of Manuscripts went down to Ashburnham Place, examined the collection volume by volume, and returned with above nine hundred of the choicest volumes and portfolios of papers, for the inspection of the trustees themselves; and they came to the conclusion that, all things considered, the collection was worth the money demanded for it; and recommended the Treasury to purchase it, and give the trustees power to make over certain portions of the Libri and Barrois collections—said to have been abstracted from the public libraries of France—to the French government on payment of twenty-four thousand pounds. To this proposition the Treasury would not agree, not being prepared to purchase the collection _en bloc_.

Then Lord Ashburnham agreed to sell the Museum the Stowe and Appendix divisions for ninety thousand pounds. The Treasury offered seventy thousand pounds; whereupon the earl requested that the manuscripts in the possession of the Museum trustees should be returned to their proper home. Determined, if possible, to avert what they regarded as an irreparable national calamity, the trustees proposed to make good the twenty thousand pounds by allowing a reduction on the annual vote for the Museum to the amount of four thousand pounds for the next five years. ‘My Lords’ were obdurate, the earl was firm; and the disappointed Museum trustees had nothing left to them but to retire with an expression of their regret at the untoward result of their efforts to save the precious manuscripts from probable expatriation. A week or two later, however, they were gladdened by receiving a verbal intimation from the guardian of the public purse that the government were ready to purchase the Stowe collection provided it could be obtained for forty thousand pounds. Lord Ashburnham would not lower his demand to that extent, but consented to accept forty-five thousand pounds. So the bargain was struck, the House of Commons voted the money, and the much-talked-of manuscripts became the property of the nation.

Whatever the pecuniary value of the Stowe collection may be, the custodians of our great library may well rejoice upon acquiring its nine hundred and ninety-six volumes of charters and cartularies; ancient missals and rituals; old English chronicles; old statutes; reports of famous trials; household books; royal wardrobe accounts; papal bulls and indulgences; historical, legal, and ecclesiastical documents; diplomatic, political, and private correspondence; and papers of more or less value to the antiquary, genealogist, and general student. In truth, the subject-matter of this mass of manuscripts is of so varied a nature that it would almost be easier to say what is not, than what is to be found therein. We shall not attempt to do either, but content ourselves with enumerating some of the curiosities of the collection.

First among these comes a volume of Anglo-Saxon charters, the cover of which is adorned with figures of saints and martyrs, and a representation of the crucifixion, worked with the needle, in coloured silks and gold-thread. The first charter in the volume is one of six lines, by which Withred, king of Kent, granted certain lands to the nuns of Liming; His Majesty, ‘being illiterate,’ making the sign of the cross against his name. Another relic of Anglo-Saxon times is the register of Hyde Abbey, Winchester, the greater part of which is supposed to have been written in the reign of Canute. On the first page are portraits of that monarch and his queen ‘Ailgythu’ in their robes of state. On the fourth leaf are memoranda of the Conqueror’s building a palace at Winchester, and of the burning of the city in 1140 by Robert, Earl of Gloucester. A copy of Alfred’s will is followed by an account of the burying-places of the Anglo-Saxon kings and saints, various forms of benedictions, a list of relics preserved at Hyde, and a calendar of saints. On one page is a fragment of the _exultat_ as chanted on Holy Saturday in the monastery, with the musical notes—consisting of lines and points placed over the syllables, and indicating by their forms the high and low tones in which these syllables were to be sung.

Of historical interest are—the original report of the trial of ‘Johanne d’Arc,’ dated the 7th of July 1456, and duly signed and attested by the notaries; the original declaration of eight of the bishops in favour of Henry VIII.’s assumption of power in church matters, in which they pronounce that Christian princes may make ecclesiastical laws; and two little volumes—one about three inches square, containing sundry calendars and tables, written on leaves of vellum, and bearing on the fly-leaf, in the handwriting of the Duke of Somerset: ‘Fere of the lord is the begenning of wisdume: put thi trust in the lord w^h all thine heart; be not wise in thyne own conseyte but fere the lord and fle from evele frome the toware the day before deth, 1551. E. SOMERSET.’ The other booklet is about an inch square, and bound in gold, enamelled in black, and furnished with two small gold rings, by which it could be suspended to its owner’s waist. It consists of a hundred and ninety-six pages of vellum, on which are written the seven penitential psalms. This was one of Henry VIII.’s gifts to Anne Boleyn, and was given by her—Horace Walpole says—to her maid of honour Mrs Wyatt, when the beautiful queen bade farewell to the world on Tower Hill.

Among other originals of political importance may be noted the return concerning the levy of ship-money, made to Sir Peter Temple, High-sheriff of Bucks, from the parish of Great Kimble, bearing the names of those who tendered their refusal to the constables and assessors; the said constables’ and assessors’ names appearing in the list of protesters, at the head of which stands the name of John Hampden. Of a little later date is the secret article of the treaty made in 1654 between Louis XIV. and the Protector of England for the expulsion from France of Charles II., the Duke of York, and eighteen royalists; Cromwell undertaking in return to expel certain Frenchmen from England. This document is signed by De Bordeaux on the part of the French king; by Fiennes, Lisle, and Strickland on the part of the Commonwealth. The Grand Monarch’s own signature appears to an order addressed to the governor of the Bastile—an order for him to permit the Countess de Bussy to sleep with her husband.

There are two literary curiosities in the shape of a five-act tragedy by Bale, Bishop of Ossory, who died in 1563; and a comedy, author unknown, intended to be played for the amusement of Elizabeth and her court; the latter ending with the following lines, addressed to Queen Bess:

May you have all the joys of innocence,
Injoyinge too all the delights of sense.
May you live long, and knowe till ye are told,
T’ endeare your beauty, and wonder you are old;
And when heaven’s heate shall draw you to the skye,
May you transfigured, not transfigured dye!

In the original draft of a dedication to be prefixed to some operas by Purcell, Dryden says: ‘Musick and poetry have ever been acknowledged sisters, which walking hand-in-hand support each other. As poetry is the harmony of words, so musick is that of notes; and as poetry is a rise above prose and oratory, so is musick the exaltation of poetry. Both of them may excel apart; but sure they are most excellent when they are joined, because nothing is then wanting to either of their perfections, for thus they appear like wit and beauty in the same person.’ At the end of a copy of Bacon’s _Essays_, presented to Mrs Newsham, in 1725, by ‘her servant, A. Pope,’ is a sonnet in the poet’s handwriting, entitled _A Wish to Mrs M. B. on her Birthday, June 15_. It is to be found in his works, expanded into a twenty-line _Epistle to Miss Martha Blount, on her Birthday_.

‘The Emperor of Morocco’s curses against his two eldest sons, taken from the original in his own writing in the register of the principal church at Morocco,’ is a curiosity, if scarcely a literary one; and the same may be said of a specimen of French penmanship—a series of portraits of the time of Louis XIV., executed with such freedom that they seem to have been done with one uninterrupted flourish of the pen. Each portrait has a song with music appended to it, the volume ending with a piece of music in Rousseau’s own hand, composed by him at Paris in 1776.

The letters, original and transcribed, in the collection are so multitudinous, that it is impossible to enter into detail about them; they cover every reign from Edward III. to George III., and unrepresented Englishmen of any note are few indeed; while epistles written by such illustrious foreigners as Doge Andrea Contarini, Francis I., Cardinal Mazarin, Louis XIV., Madame de Maintenon, Voltaire, Frederick the Great, Mirabeau, Lafayette, and Napoleon the Great, figure in the catalogue of contents.

We must mention that among the treasures acquired by the nation are a number of manuscripts in the Irish language, and of manuscripts relating to the history and antiquities of Ireland; besides the correspondence of Arthur Capel, Earl of Essex, Lord-lieutenant of Ireland under Charles II. The government having decided that manuscripts in the Irish language, and those bearing more or less directly upon Irish history and literature, should be lent indefinitely to the Royal Irish Academy, for the use of students and the public, the greater portion of the above will be lost to Bloomsbury—how large a portion will not be known, until the representatives of the British Museum and the Irish Academy have settled the matter between them.

A SKETCH FROM MY STUDY WINDOW.

There were three of them, little pale-faced, grave-eyed girl-children, unmistakable Londoners in their lack of the healthy colouring and sturdy limbs which would have marked country-bred children of their age. The eldest was perhaps eleven; the younger ones, eight and six years old respectively; and it was pretty, as well as pathetic, to see the prematurely motherly care which the eldest sister—whom the little ones called ‘Gertie’—bestowed upon the tiny mite whose responsible protector she seemed to be.

When first I noticed them, they were walking demurely round the gravel-path of the square upon which my study window looks out. Each had a skipping-rope dangling loosely from her hands; and the younger ones were evidently intent upon some grave story from the lips of their sister. Presently, they came along the upper side of the garden, towards my window, and I had my first glimpse of their faces. Each was pretty in her childish way. The eldest, tall for her age, slight and dark, had regular features and soft brown eyes, whose naturally pathetic expression was heightened by the deep mourning-frock and crape-trimmed hat which each alike was wearing. The two younger children were less noticeable in appearance, the second being, I fancied, ordinarily a merry, dimpled little maiden, whom, but for some temporary cloud on her spirits, I could more easily have pictured enjoying a good game of romps with some of the other small frequenters of our garden; and the youngest, like Gertrude, a pensive-faced baby, with sadly transparent colouring and fragile figure, betokening constitutional delicacy. It was summer-time; and as they passed beneath my widely opened window, I caught the word ‘Mother’ two or three times repeated, gravely pronounced by Gertie; and I judged, from the reverent expression of the three little faces and from their deep mourning, that she was recalling to the memory of her charges some childish reminiscences of a recently lost parent.

I had certainly never seen them before, or, child-worshipper that I was, I could not have failed to recognise them. All the other young people in the garden—from Tommy, surname unknown, aged two, with a penchant for sticky sweetmeats, and an aversion to nurses, to Miss Mildred Holford, verging upon sweet seventeen, and alternating between spasmodic propriety and innate tomboyism—were intimately known to me—by sight, at all events; and in my idle speculations upon the little strangers, I jumped to the conclusion—subsequently verified—that they were new-comers to one of the large empty houses facing mine on the further side of our square.

From that day forward I saw them frequently, generally, as on the first occasion, alone, the eldest in charge of the younger ones, sometimes accompanied by a tall lady, also in deep mourning, whom they addressed as ‘auntie;’ sometimes with a sober, matronly looking nurse, who carried in her arms a bundle of white drapery, enveloping what I opined to be a baby of tender weeks. This baby was the favourite toy of the three little sisters. Nothing else possessed the slightest attraction for them when their tiny brother was present; and it was a pretty study to watch the pride and delight of the two elder girls, when their nurse allowed each in turn to carry the white-robed atom a few steps away from her side and back again. Nor was little Ethel, the youngest of the trio, debarred from the privilege of playing nurse sometimes. Too weak and frail to be safely trusted to carry the precious burden, it was her chief delight to sit, still as a mouse, on the corner of one of the garden-seats, crooning and talking baby-talk to the unconscious morsel on her lap, while the nurse and elder girls kept guard at a few yards’ distance, their absence being clearly a highly valued condition of this innocent ‘confidence-trick.’

Morning after morning, throughout the first week of their residence in our square, was the same routine carried out; the younger ones sometimes indulging in a run with their hoops, from Gertie’s side; sometimes amusing themselves with dolls or skipping-ropes; or again listening while their aunt or Gertrude read aloud to them. But on Saturday morning they did not appear as usual, and I found myself quite missing their company, and puzzling myself with vague speculations to account for their absence. Even in this short time my heart had gone out towards the little motherless girls, and I had begun unconsciously to weave fanciful theories of their past and present life, to account for the sweet seriousness and precocious womanly airs of the eldest girl, and the influence of love—for her manner was untinged by any assumption of elder-sisterly prerogative—which she clearly possessed and exercised over the younger ones. Rightly or wrongly, I never knew, but I pictured them the children of parents separated by a long interval of years in age, but united by strong bonds of confidence and affection. Gertrude’s sedate air suggested that she had been rather the companion than the plaything of her mother; and that the mother’s influence had been tender, without caprice, was apparent from her child’s gentle gravity, and from the unquestioning attention paid to her lightest hint or remonstrance by the younger sisters. The words, ‘Mother would not have wished it,’ or, ‘Father would not like to see it,’ from her lips were sufficient in a moment to quell Edith’s occasional fractiousness, or to dry Ethel’s ready tears; while the confidence existing between all three was enough to show that no undue favouritism had ever wakened jealousy of one another. Unselfish to a fault, Gertrude was the one to give way in every question of mere personal preference; but she never swerved from her adherence to what she believed would be ‘mother’s’ wish or course of action, and an appeal from her opinion to aunt or nurse was rare indeed.

Such were some of my dreams of these little ones that Saturday morning. Luncheon-time came, and passed, without a sign; and so restless and idle had I been all morning, owing to the absurd interest I had taken in the non-appearance of my little friends, that, contrary to my usual custom, I was obliged to forego my half-holiday and settle to work again. Suddenly, glancing from my book for the thousandth time that day, I spied the little trio approaching. They looked less grave than usual, and were manifestly preoccupied, as I judged from the frequent glances cast by one and all towards the entrance-gate, at the far corner of the square. At last the cause became evident. The gate swung open, and an elderly gentleman in deep mourning came hastily into the garden. He was quickly perceived; and with a glad cry of ‘Father!’ all three children scampered off to meet him. ‘Father’s’ half-holiday was clearly the event of the week for his little motherless girls; and for the first time since I had seen her, the sad cloud passed from Gertie’s eyes, and for a few hours was lost in the light of unalloyed happiness. Under ‘father’s’ generalship they played merry childish games, laughing and romping as I had never yet deemed it possible they could laugh or romp; and when the delicate little Ethel grew weary and could play no longer, there was a knee for each of the younger pets, and a seat at her father’s side for Gertrude, while it was evident that he was spinning yarns and racking his brains for fairy tales, each of which was rewarded with unanimous applause, and reiterated calls upon the narrator’s memory or invention. So passed the happy holiday afternoon, a peaceful idyll in the great prose volume of London life; and when at length the father rose from his seat, and, with a tiny hand in each of his, moved slowly homewards, I felt as if the colour had faded out of the summer evening, and the workaday clouds had begun to close in upon me again.

So the July days glided by, bringing no greater change into the lives of my three little maidens than the regular alternations of grave morning walks and gay Saturday afternoon romps. They seemed shy of making friends among their light-hearted young neighbours; and the other children appeared to be awed and checked in their advances by the sombre crape and sedate looks of the new-comers. Now and then, a timid overture was made, generally to Edith, the second of the trio, whose dimpled cheeks looked more suggestive of successful negotiation than her sisters’ demure faces; but such attempts were rare, and as a rule, my own unsuspected interest was the only notice taken of their doings, and they were left unmolested in the pursuit of their quiet routine.

By-and-by my vacation-time arrived, and I left the heat and bustle of London for a country rest. On my return, the days had shortened perceptibly, the sun was shorn of half his brightness, the garden trees were shedding their leaves, and autumn fogs and winter frosts were approaching apace. There, as usual, on the first morning after my return to work, were the little ladies. But there were no longer quiet hours of basking in sunshine on the seats, and much of the sober confabulation seemed to have taken wing with the flight of their summer surroundings. Time was acting its usual part as the disperser of clouds and lightener of hearts. ‘Mother’ had become less a recent reality than a sweet occasional memory, and the young blood of the younger sisters called for more active exercise than the grave promenade that had sufficed previously.

But as autumn faded into winter, and the London sky donned its accustomed leaden-hued uniform, the fireside usurped the attractions of the window-seat, and but for an occasional glimpse, accidentally caught as I passed the window, I lost sight of my little triad of maidens.

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