Chapter II: Part 2

The gains of some of the swell mob are great. They can always command capital to execute any especial scheme. Their travelling expenses are large; for their harvests are great public occasions, whether in town or country. As an example of their profits, the exploits of four of them at the Liverpool Cattle Show some seven years ago, may be mentioned. The London Detective Police did not attend, but one of them waylaid the rogues at the Euston Station. After an attendance of four days, the gentlemen he was looking for appeared, handsomely attired, the occupants of first-class carriages. The Detective, in the quietest manner possible, stopped their luggage; they entreated him to treat them like “gentlemen.” He did so, and took them into a private room, where they were so good as to offer him fifty pounds to let them go. He declined, and over-hauled their booty; it consisted of several gold pins, watches, (some of great value,) chains and rings, silver snuffboxes, and bank-notes of the value of one hundred pounds! Eventually, however, as owners could not be found for some of the property, and some others would not prosecute, they escaped with a light punishment.

In order to counteract the plans of the swell mob, two of the sergeants of the Detective Police make it their business to know every one of them personally. The consequence is, that the appearance of either of these officers upon any scene of operations is a bar to anything or anybody being “done.” This is an excellent characteristic of the Detectives, for they thus become as well a Preventive Police. We will give an illustration:—

You are at the Oxford commemoration. As you descend the broad stairs of the Roebuck to dine, you overtake on the landing a gentleman of foreign aspect and elegant attire. The variegated pattern of his vest, the jetty gloss of his boots, and the exceeding whiteness of his gloves—one of which he crushes in his somewhat delicate hand—convince you that he is going to the grand ball, to be given that evening at Merton. The glance he gives you while passing, is sharp, but comprehensive; and if his eye does rest upon any one part of your person and its accessories more than another, it is upon the gold watch which you have just taken out to see if dinner be “due.” As you step aside to make room for him, he acknowledges the courtesy with “Par-r-r-don,” in the richest Parisian _gros parle_, and a smile so full of intelligence and courtesy, that you hope he speaks English, for you set him down as an agreeable fellow, and mentally determine that if he dines in the Coffee-room, you will make his acquaintance.

On the mat at the stair-foot there stands a man. A plain, honest-looking fellow, with nothing formidable in his appearance, or dreadful in his countenance; but the effect his apparition takes on your friend in perspective, is remarkable. The poor little fellow raises himself on his toes, as if he had been suddenly overbalanced by a bullet; his cheek pales, and his lip quivers, as he endeavours ineffectually to suppress the word “_coquin!_” He knows it is too late to turn back (he evidently would, if he could), for the man’s eye is upon him. There is no help for it, and he speaks first; but in a whisper. He takes the new comer aside, and all you can overhear is spoken by the latter, who says he insists on Monsieur withdrawing his “School” by the seven o’clock train.

You imagine him to be some poor wretch of a schoolmaster in difficulties; captured, alas, by a bailiff. They leave the inn together, perhaps for a sponging house. So acute is your pity, that you think of rushing after them, and offering bail. You are, however, very hungry, and, at this moment, the waiter announces that dinner is on table.

In the opposite box there are covers for four, but only three convives. They seem quiet men—not gentlemen, decidedly, but well enough behaved.

“What has become of Monsieur?” asks one. None of them can divine.

“Shall we wait any longer for him?”

“Oh, no—Waiter—Dinner!”

By their manner, you imagine that the style of the Roebuck is a “cut above them.” They have not been much used to plate. The silver forks are so curiously heavy, that one of the guests, in a dallying sort of way, balances a prong across his fingers, while the chasing of the castors engages the attention of a second. This is all done while they talk. When the fish is brought, the third casts a careless glance or two at the dish cover, and when the waiter has gone for the sauce, he taps it with his nails, and says enquiringly to his friend across the table, “Silver?”

The other shakes his head, and intimates a hint that it is _only_ plated. The waiter brings the cold punch, and the party begin to enjoy themselves. They do not drink much, but they mix their drinks rather injudiciously. They take sherry upon cold punch, and champagne upon that, dashing in a little port and bottled stout between. They are getting merry, not to say jolly, but not at all inebriated. The amateur of silver dish-covers has told a capital story, and his friends are revelling in the heartiest of laughs, when an apparition appears at the end of the table. You never saw such a change as his presence causes, when he places his knuckles on the edge of the table and looks at the diners _seriatim_; the courtiers of the sleeping beauty suddenly struck somniferous were nothing to this change. As if by magic, the loud laugh is turned to silent consternation. You now, most impressively, understand the meaning of the term “dumbfoundered.” The mysterious stranger makes some enquiry about “any cash?”

The answer is “Plenty.”

“All square with the landlord, then?” asks the same inflexible voice as—to my astonishment—that which put the Frenchman to the torture.

“To a penny,” the reply.

“_Quite_ square?” continues the querist, taking with his busy eye a rapid inventory of the plate.

“S’ help me——”

“Hush!” interrupts the dinner spoiler, holding up his hand in a cautionary manner. “Have you done anything to-day?”

“Not a thing.”

Then there is some more in a low tone; but you again distinguish the word “school,” and “seven o’clock train.” They are too old to be the Frenchman’s pupils; perhaps they are his assistants. Surely they are not all the victims of the same _capias_ and the same officer!

By this time the landlord, looking very nervous, arrives with his bill: then comes the head waiter, who clears the table; carefully counting the forks. The reckoning is paid, and the trio steal out of the room with the man of mystery behind them,—like sheep driven to the shambles.

You follow to the Railway station, and there you see the Frenchman, who complains bitterly of being “sold for noting” by his enemy. The other three utter a confirmative groan. In spite of the evident omnipotence of their persevering follower, your curiosity impels you to address him. You take a turn on the platform together, and he explains the whole mystery. “The fact is,” he begins, “I am Sergeant Witchem, of the Detective police.”

“And your four victims are?”—

“Members of a crack school of swell mobsmen.”

“What do you mean by ‘school?’”

“Gang. There is a variety of gangs—that is to say, of men who ‘work’ together, who play into one another’s hands. These gentlemen hold the first rank, both for skill and enterprise, and had they been allowed to remain would have brought back a considerable booty. Their chief is the Frenchman.”

“Why do they obey your orders so passively?”

“Because they are sure that if I were to take them into custody, which I could do, knowing what they are, and present them before a magistrate, they would all be committed to prison for a month, as rogues and vagabonds.”

“They prefer then to have lost no inconsiderable capital in dress and dinner, to being laid up in jail.”

“Exactly so.”

The bell rings, and all five go off into the same carriage to London.

This is a circumstance that actually occurred; and a similar one happened when the Queen went to Dublin. The mere appearance of one of the Detective officers before a “school” which had transported itself in the Royal train, spoilt their speculation; for they all found it more advantageous to return to England in the same steamer with the officer, than to remain with the certainty of being put in prison for fourteen or twenty-eight days as rogues and vagabonds.

So thoroughly well acquainted with these men are the Detective officers we speak of, that they frequently tell what they have been about by the expression of their eyes and their general manner. This process is aptly termed “reckoning them up.” Some days ago, two skilful officers, whose personal acquaintance with the swell mob is complete, were walking along the Strand on other business, when they saw two of the best dressed and best mannered of the gang enter a jeweller’s shop. They waited till they came out, and, on scrutinising them, were convinced, by a certain conscious look which they betrayed, that they had stolen something. They followed them, and in a few minutes something was passed from one to the other. The officers were convinced, challenged them with the theft, and succeeded in eventually convicting them of stealing two gold eye-glasses, and several jewelled rings. “The eye,” said our informant, “is the great detector. We can tell in a crowd what a swell-mobsman is about by the expression of his eye.”

It is supposed that the number of persons who make a trade of thieving in London is not more than six thousand; of these, nearly two hundred are first-class thieves or swell mobsmen; six hundred “macemen,” and trade swindlers, bill-swindlers, dog-stealers, &c.; About forty burglars, “dancers,” “garretteers,” and other adepts with the skeleton-keys. The rest are pickpockets, “gonophs—” mostly young thieves who sneak into areas, and rob tills—and other pilferers.

To detect and circumvent this fraternity, is the science of thief-taking. Here, it is, however, impossible to give even an imperfect notion of the high amount of skill, intelligence, and knowledge, concentrated in the character of a clever Detective Policeman. We shall therefore furnish the sketch in another paper.

THE BALLAD OF RICHARD BURNELL.

From his bed rose Richard Burnell
At the early dawn of day,
Ere the bells of London City
Welcomed in the morn of May.

Early on that bright May morning
Rose the young man from his bed,
He, the happiest man in London,—
And blithely to himself he said:

“‘When the men and maids are dancing,
And the folk are mad with glee,
In the Temple’s shady gardens
Let me walk and talk with thee!’

“Thus my Alice spake last even,
Thus with trembling lips she spake,
And those blissful words have kept me
Through the live-long night awake.

“’Tis a joy beyond expression,
When we first, in truth, perceive
That the love we long have cherished
Will not our fond hearts deceive!

“Never dared I to confess it,
Deeds of homage spoke instead;
True love is its own revealer,
She must know it! oft, I said.

“All my words, and all my actions,
But one meaning could impart;
Love can love’s least sign interpret,
And she reads my inmost heart.

“And her good, old merchant father,
—Father he has been to me—
Saw the love growing up between us,
Saw—and was well-pleased to see.

“Seven years I truly served him,
Now my time is at an end—
Master is he now no longer,
Father will be—has been friend.

“I was left betimes an orphan,
Heir unto great merchant-wealth,
But the iron rule of kinsfolk
Dimmed my youth, and sapped my health.

“Death had been my early portion
Had not my good guardian come;
He, the father of my Alice,
And conveyed me to his home.

“Here began a new existence,
—Then how new the love of friends!
And for all the child’s afflictions,
Each one strove to make amends.

“Late my spring-time came, but quickly
Youth’s rejoicing currents run,
And my inner life unfolded
Like a flower before the sun.

“Hopes, and aims, and aspirations,
Grew within the growing boy;
Life had new interpretation;
Manhood brought increase of joy.

“In and over all was Alice,
Life-infusing, like the spring;
My soul’s soul! even joy without her
Was a poor and barren thing!

“And she spoke last eve at parting,
‘When the folk are mad with glee,
In the Temple’s pleasant gardens
Let me walk and talk with thee!’

“As she spoke, her sweet voice trembled—
Love such tender tones can teach!
And those words have kept me waking,
And the manner of her speech!

“For such manner has deep meaning,”
Said young Burnell, blithe and gay;—
And the bells of London City
Pealed a welcome to the May.

· · · · ·

Whilst the folk were mad with pleasure,
’Neath the elm-tree’s vernal shade,
In the Temple’s quiet gardens
Walked the young man and the maid.

On his arm her hand was resting,
And her eyes were on the ground;
She was speaking, he was silent;
Not a word his tongue had found.

“Friend beloved,” she thus addressed him,
“I have faith, and hope in thee!
Thou canst do what no one else can—
Thou canst be a friend to me!

“Richard, we have lived together
All these years of happy youth;
Have, as sister and as brother,
Lived in confidence and truth.

“Thou from me hast hid no feelings,
Thy whole heart to me is known;
I—I only have kept from thee
One dear, little thought alone.

“Have I wronged thee in so doing,
Then forgive me! but give ear,
’Tis to bare my heart before thee
That I now am with thee here.

“Well thou know’st my father loves thee;
’Tis his wish that we should wed,—
I shame not to speak thus frankly—
Wish, or _will_ more justly said.

“But this cannot be, my brother,
Cannot be—’twere nature’s wrong!—
I have said so to my father,—
But thou know’st his will is strong.”

Not a word spake Richard Burnell;
Not a word came to his lips;
Like one tranced he stood and listened;
Life to him was in eclipse.

In a lower tone she murmured,
Murmured like a brooding dove,
“Know thou,—Leonard Woodvil loves me,—
And—that he has won my love.”

—Came a pause. The words she uttered
Seemed to turn him into stone,
Pale he stood and mute beside her,
And with blushes she went on.

“This is known unto my father;—
Leonard is well known to thee,
Thou hast praised him, praised him often—
Oh, how dear such praise to me!

“But my father, stern and stedfast,
Will not list to Leonard’s prayer;—
And ’tis only thou canst move him,—
Only thou so much canst dare.

“Tell my father firmly, freely,
That we only love each other—
’Tis the truth, thou know’st it, Richard,
As a sister and a brother!

“Tell my father, if we wedded,
Thou and I, it would be guilt!—
Thus it is that thou canst aid us,—
And thou wilt—I know thou wilt!

“Yes, ’tis thus that thou must aid us,
And thou wilt!—I say no more!—
We’ve been friends, but this will make us
Better friends than heretofore!”

Yet some moments he was silent;
His good heart was well nigh broke;
She was blinded to his anguish;—
And “I will!” at length he spoke.

· · · · ·

They were wedded. ’Twas a wedding
That had far and nigh renown,
And from morning until even
Rang the bells of London town.

Time went on: the good, old merchant
Wore a cloud upon his brow:
“Wherefore this?” his friends addressed him,
“No man should be blithe as thou!”

“In my old age I am lonely,”
Said the merchant; “she is gone;—
And young Burnell, he I nurtured,
He who was to me a son;

“He has left me!—I’m deserted—
E’en an old man feels such woe!
’Twas but natural _she_ should marry,
But _he_ should not have served me so?

“’Twas not that which I expected!—
He was very dear to me,—
And I thought no London merchant
Would have stood as high as he!

“He grew very strange and moody,
What the cause I cannot say;—
And he left me when my daughter,
My poor Alice went away!

“This I felt a sore unkindness;—
Youth thinks little, feels still less!—
Burnell should have stayed beside me,
Stayed to cheer my loneliness!

“I had been a father to him,
He to me was like a son;
Young folks should have more reflection,—
’Twas what _I_ could not have done!

“True, he writes me duteous letters;
Calls me father, tells me all
That in foreign parts are doing:—
But young people write so small,

“That I’m often forced to leave them,
Pleasant letters though they be,
Until Alice comes from Richmond,
Then she reads them out to me.

“Alice fain would have me with her;
Leonard well deserves my praise—
But he’s not my Richard Burnell,
Knows not my old wants and ways!

“No, my friends, I’ll not deny it,
It has cut me to the heart,
That the son of my adoption
Thus has played a cruel part!”

So the merchant mourned and murmured;
And all foreign charms unheeding,
Dwelt the lonely Richard Burnell,
With his bruiséd heart still bleeding.

· · · · ·

Time went on, and in the spring-tide,
When the birds begun to build,
And the heart of all creation
With a vast delight was filled.

Came a letter unto Alice—
Then a babe lay on her breast—
’Twas the first which Richard Burnell
Unto Alice had addressed.

Few the words which it contained,
But each word was like a sigh;
“I am sick and very lonely;—
Let me see thee ere I die!

“In this time of tribulation
Thou wilt be a friend to me:
Therefore in the Temple Gardens
Let me once more speak with thee.”

Once more in the Temple Gardens
Sat they ’neath the bright blue sky,
With the leafage thick around them,
And the river rolling by.

Pale and weak was Richard Burnell,
Gone all merely outward grace,
Yet the stamp of meek endurance
Gave sad beauty to his face.

Silent by his side sat Alice,
Now no word her tongue could speak,
All her soul was steeped in pity,
And large tears were on her cheek.

Burnell spake; “Within these Gardens
Thy commands on me were laid,
And although my heart was breaking
Yet were those commands obeyed.

“What I suffered no one knoweth,
Nor shall know, I proudly said,
And, when grew the grief too mighty,
Then—there was no help—I fled.

“Yes, I loved thee, long had loved thee,
And alone the God above,
He, who at that time sustained me,
Knows the measure of my love!

“Do not let these words displease thee;
Life’s sore battle will soon cease;
I have fallen amid the conflict,
But within my soul is peace.

“It has been a fiery trial,
But the fiercest pang is past;
Once more I am come amongst you—
Oh, stand by me at the last!

“Leonard will at times come to me,
And thy father, I will try
To be cheerful in his presence,
As I was in days gone by.

“Bitter had it been to leave him,
But in all my heart’s distress,
The great anguish which consumed me,
Seemed to swallow up the less.

“Let me go! my soul is wearied,
No fond heart of me has need,
Life has no more duties for me;—
I am but a broken reed!

“Let me go, ere courage faileth,
Gazing, gazing thus on thee!—
But in life’s last awful moment,
Alice! thou wilt stand by me!”

From her seat rose Alice Woodvil,
And in stedfast tones began,
Like a strong yet mourning angel,
To address the dying man.

“Not in death alone, my brother,
Would I aid thee in the strife,
I would fain be thy sustainer,
In the fiercer fight of life.

“With the help of God, thy spirit
Shall not sink an easy prey.
Oh, my friend, prayer is a weapon
Which can turn whole hosts away!

“God will aid thee! We will hold thee
By our love!—thou shalt not go!—
And from out thy wounded spirit,
We will pluck the thorns of woe.

“Say not life has no more duties
Which can claim thee! where are then,
All the sinners; the neglected;
All the weeping sons of men?

“Ah, my friend, hast thou forgotten
All our dreams of early days?
How we would instruct poor children,
How we would the fallen raise!

“God has not to me permitted,
Such great work of human love,
He has marked me out a lower
Path of duty where to move.

“But to thee, His chosen servant,
Is this higher lot allowed;
He has brought thee through deep waters,
Through the furnace, through the cloud;

“He has made of thee, a mourner
Like the Christ, that thou may’st rise,
To a purer height of glory,
Through the pangs of sacrifice!

“’Tis alone of his appointing,
That thy feet on thorns have trod;
Suffering, woe, renunciation,
Only bring us nearer God.

“And when nearest Him then largest
The enfranchised heart’s embrace:—
It was Christ, the man rejected,
Who redeemed the human race.

“Say not then thou hast no duties;—
Friendless outcasts on thee call,
And the sick and the afflicted,
And the children, more than all.

“Oh, my friend, rise up and follow,
Where the hand of God shall lead;
He has brought thee through affliction,
But to fit thee for his need!”

—Thus she spoke, and as from midnight,
Springs the opal-tinted morn,
So, within his dreary spirit,
A new day of life was born.

Strength sublime may rise from weakness,
Groans be turned to songs of praise,
Nor are life’s divinest labours,
Only told by length of days.

Young he died: but deeds of mercy,
Beautified his life’s short span,
And he left his worldly substance,
To complete what he began.

A FEW FACTS ABOUT MATRIMONY.

Modern science is invading all the old realms of whims and fancies, charms and witchcrafts, prejudices and superstitions. No kind of ignorance seems sacred from attack. The wise men of our generation are evidently bent beyond recall on finding out all things that may by possibility be discoverable, no matter what pains the search may impose. Not content with making lightning run messages, chemistry polish boots, and steam deliver parcels and passengers, the _savants_ are superseding the astrologers of old days, and the gipsies and wise women of modern ones, by finding out and revealing the hitherto hidden laws which rule that charming mystery of mysteries—that lode star of young maidens and gay bachelors—matrimony.

In our fourteenth number we gave a description of the facts made out by the returns of the Registrar-General on the subject of life and death in London and the Country. The office of that official has some other duties, however, beyond that of chronicling the business of mortality and birth in this land of ours. There is a third great heading in his tables, under which there are long lists of serious looking figures, and they tell, not in units, or in _fews_, like the back page of a newspaper, but in tens of thousands, how many marriages take place in England. And besides the mere number of these interesting events, these figures reveal what are found to be the laws regulating their frequency and other circumstances connected with them, such as how many couples are joined by the costly and unusual mode of special license; how many by ordinary license; how many (and they are the great majority) by the old English fashion of “out-asking” by banns; how many by the new systems introduced for the union of various classes of dissenters, at Registrars’ offices, in registered places of worship; how many between Quakers and between Jews; and, beyond all these particulars, how many young folks, hot of heart and full of courage, take the awful plunge into matrimony whilst “not of full age;” how many men reject the advice of Sir Roger de Coverley, and marry widows; and how many widows, like the wife of Bath, love matrimony so well that when once released from its bonds they tie themselves up in them again. The history of this registration of marriages is soon told. This plan of recording the matrimonial engagements of the country commenced in 1745, when the marriage act came into operation. Before that date marriages were performed clandestinely, and by such extraordinary persons that any correct record of their number was impossible. “Fleet marriages” are thus noticed by Smollett:—“There was a band of profligate miscreants, the refuse of the clergy, dead to every sentiment of virtue, abandoned to all sense of decency and decorum, for the most part prisoners for debt or delinquency, and indeed the very outcasts of human society, who hovered about the verge of the Fleet Prison to intercept customers, plying like porters for employment, and performed the ceremony of marriage without license or question, in cellars, garrets, or alehouses, to the scandal of religion, and the disgrace of that order which they professed. The ease with which this ecclesiastical sanction was obtained, and the vicious disposition of those wretches open to the practices of fraud and corruption, were productive of polygamy, indigence, conjugal infidelity, prostitution, and every curse that could embitter the married state. A remarkable case of this nature having fallen under the cognizance of the Peers (in 1753) in an appeal from an inferior tribunal, that House ordered the judges to prepare a new Bill for preventing such abuses; and one was accordingly framed, under the auspices of Lord Hardwick, at that time Lord High Chancellor of England.”

“It underwent a great number of alterations and amendments, which were not effected without violent contest and altercation; at length, however, it was floated through both houses on the tide of a great majority, and steered into the safe harbour of royal approbation.”

For seventy-seven years after the passing of this bill the number of marriages was collected with tolerable accuracy, and published in the Parish Register Abstracts. No other country has so valuable an abstract of tables. Since that time the Registrar-General’s office has made this branch of our national statistics almost accurate.

Premising that the documents from which our statements are derived are the Annual Reports of the Registrar-General, of Births, Deaths, and Marriages, in England, issued—not for a short term, but during the last six years—that the observations extend over a still longer period—we may proceed to cull out what appear to be the economical laws regulating matrimony, with any peculiarities characterising their operation amongst us. We would say the _general_ laws—for individual peculiarities will, of course, influence individual matches. One young lady will secure the youth of her choice by force of beauty, or by mere weight of purse; managing mothers will get husbands for their girls, whatever wind may blow, or however trade or politics may influence the less fortunate or less clever world. The great beauty, the great talents, and the great wealth are the exceptions in the lottery of life. In speaking of matrimonial prospects we, like the Registrar-General, mean the prospects of the great family of twenty millions of souls that make up the population of this land we live in.

About a century ago, the marriages in London were under six thousand a year—they are now four times as many. In all the country, the increase has been most remarkable in the Metropolis and in Manchester. In particular localities the proportion is found to differ. Thus Yorkshire, the seat of the Woollen manufactures and of prosperous agriculturists, appears to be the most marrying district of all England; Lancashire and Cheshire, the Cotton districts, coming next; and London third. Staffordshire and Worcestershire, Northamptonshire and Huntingdonshire stand next, followed by other counties more or less blessed by the presence of Hymen, but descending gradually till we reach the matrimonial zero which is found in the agricultural parts of Middlesex. The average annual number of weddings is about one hundred and twenty-three thousand. It would help a winter night’s amusement to decide how many pounds weight of Californian produce must be wanted for the rings? How many garlands of orange blossoms for the hair and bonnets of the brides? The probabilities of marriage, of course, vary; but the rule seems to hold, that about one in seventeen unmarried women, between the ages of fifteen and forty-five, are married in a year throughout the country. Marriages have their seasons. They are least numerous in winter, and most numerous after harvest in the December quarter; the births and deaths, on the contrary, are most numerous in the winter quarter ending in March, and least numerous in the summer quarter ending September. War diminishes marriages by taking great numbers of marriageable men away from their homes; whilst a return of peace increases marriages, when soldiers and sailors with small pensions are discharged. Trade and manufactures have also become more active in England on the cessation of wars, and the employment and wages thus induced, have contributed still more to add to the numbers of those entering the married state. The establishment of new, or the extension of old, employments promotes marriages: the cotton manufactures, the canals of the last century, the railways of the present day, are examples. Indeed, an increase of their incomes, is taken by the generality of the people for the beginning of perennial prosperity, and is followed by a multitude of marriages. There are only about fifteen persons married annually, for the first time, out of a thousand living. There are about five children born in wedlock to every marriage. The births now exceed the deaths in England, in about the proportion of three to two—three young subjects present themselves for Queen Victoria, in place of every two that pass away. “The number of marriages in a nation,” says the Registrar, “perhaps fluctuates independently of external causes; but it is a fair deduction from the facts, that the marriage returns in England point to periods of prosperity, little less distinctly than the funds measure the hopes and fears of the money market. If the one is the barometer of credit, the other is the barometer of prosperity—a prosperity partly in possession, and still more in hope.” The year 1845 was a great matrimonial year, the proportion of persons married being more than had been known in England for ninety years before. It was a season of great speculation, activity, and temporary prosperity. Three years before, in 1842, on the contrary, there was a great diminution in the number of weddings. It was a year of difficulty and high prices. Rather more than ten per cent. of the persons married in 1845, had been married more than once. When food is dear, as in 1839, marriages are few; as food becomes cheap, as in 1845, marriages are many. When a cheap food year indicates a year of “marrying and giving in marriage,” another sign is generally found; the price of consols indicates a condition of national affairs much more conducive to matrimonial arrangements, than young ladies would imagine. In what may be called the great English matrimonial period, the three per cents. were about par, instead of being about 88, as they were in the unfavourable season a short time before. When employment is plenty, trade active, and money _easy_, Doctors Commons becomes brisk, clergymen have long lists of banns to declare, and the Registrar’s column of marriages fills up.

As an instance of the influence of the price of food and want of employment upon the number of marriages, let us take an illustration from the Registrar as to the period from 1792 to 1798. The weather was bad, the funds low, and bread excessively dear, and upon particular districts a change of fashion made the burthen fall with still additional weight. The “Church and King” riots broke out in July, 1791, in Birmingham; and the mob burnt Dr. Priestley’s library, several houses, and some dissenting chapels; in May, 1792, they again rose, but the magistrates this time evinced some vigour, and put a stop to the outrages. A staple manufacture of Birmingham had been subject to one of the mutations of fashion, which caused great distress; for it is recorded, that, on December 21st, 1791, “several respectable buckle-manufacturers from Birmingham, Walsall, and Wolverhampton, waited upon His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, with a petition setting forth the distressed situation of thousands in the different branches of the buckle manufacture, from the fashion now, and for some time back, so prevalent, of wearing shoe-strings instead of buckles. His Royal Highness graciously promised his utmost assistance by his example and influence.” After the recovery of George III. from his first illness, in 1789, an immense number of buckles were manufactured about Birmingham; Walsall among other places invested the greater part of its available wealth in the speculation. The king unfortunately went in the state procession to St. Paul’s without buckles: and Walsall was nearly ruined. Shoe-strings gradually supplied the place of straps. The effect of this freak of fashion and speculation on the marriages of Birmingham was to reduce them most seriously; and it had probably more to do with the licentious Birmingham riots, than the more patent political agitation of the day. The disuse of wigs, buckles, buttons, and leather breeches at the close of the eighteenth century, is supposed to have affected the business of a million of people. In 1765, the peace of London had been disturbed by the periwig-makers, who went in procession to petition the young king, “submitting to His Majesty’s goodness and wisdom, whether his own example was not the only means of rescuing them from their distress, as far as it was occasioned by so many people wearing their own hair.” When change of fashions influence unfavourably the employment of the people, and when, at the same time, influenced or increased by lack of work, their poverty increases, matrimony is at a discount. It is not simply the poorer classes, dependent on weekly wages for their support, who feel the influence of times of business activity, and allow it to impel them to matrimony. When the workman is busy, the trader makes profits, the landlord gets his rents, and all sections of the community feel the beneficial influence of a prosperous season. The number of those persons entirely removed from such social sympathies is very few; indeed, as a great rule, when the workmen are prosperous, all classes above them are thriving too: and when the one section of the great English family is influenced to matrimony in an unusual degree, the others feel the influence of the same law. When the reaction, a period of depression, arrives, the number of marriages declines, but they have never fallen back to their original numbers. A time of prosperity lifts up the total in a remarkable manner, and when the happy time ceases, the number falls—but not equal to the level from which it sprung. It is to a certain degree a permanent increase.

As to the mode in which marriages are performed, it appears that nine out of ten take place according to the rites of the established church. The marriages by banns are about six times as numerous as those by license. Upon these weddings, by aid of Doctors Commons, there is, it seems, a vast sum of money spent; but who are the lucky men receiving it, does not appear very clearly, and the services they render for the cash is still more doubtful. There are about eighteen thousand licenses granted by Doctors Commons and by country surrogates every year. The usual cost of the license at Doctors Commons is 2_l._ 12_s._ 6_d._ There is 10_s._ 6_d._ additional for minors; and in the country, surrogates, it is said, obtain higher fees. At only 2_l._ 12_s._ 6_d._, the tax on eighteen thousand licenses is 47,250_l._ a year. The stamps on each license are 12_s._ 6_d._ Deducting this sum, the licenses to marry yield at least 36,000_l._ a year. The expense of granting licenses in a manner the most useful and convenient to the public would not be considerable; and it is not easy to see why the surplus revenue derivable from the tax, should not go into the public treasury, when a portion of the expenses of the registration of births, deaths, and marriages, is paid out of the Consolidated Fund. The aggregate amount of charges for the General Register Office, at which all the returns of the country are examined, indexed, and analysed, and the Act is administered, was 13,794_l._ in 1846; and the six hundred and twenty-one superintendent registrars received 9097_l._ for examining certified copies. After discharging the expenses of the civil registration, defrayed by the Consolidated Fund, and the cost of the decennial census, a large surplus would be left, out of 47,250_l._ for licenses, to go to the public revenue of the country. And this would not interfere in the slightest degree with the marriage fees; which would continue to be paid to the officiating clergy. In the places of worship registered by Dissenters, there were not quite ten thousand marriages in one year; nearly four thousand in the same year took place in the Superintendant Registrar’s offices; one hundred and eighty-four according to the rites of the Jews; and seventy-four marriages between Quakers. The only fortuneteller who can henceforth be believed, is the one who answers the question, “When will the wedding take place?” by saying, “When trade flourishes, and when bread is cheap.”

CHIPS.

FROM MR. THOMAS BOVINGTON.

Long Hornets, June, 1850.

SIR,

I want to ask you a few questions, Mr. Conductor. In the first place—What am I to do with my beasts? Those I got back from Smithfield, after two months’ care and no small expense, have come round again, and I’ve got a few others ready for market; but _what_ market? Country markets don’t suit me, for I can’t get my price at them; and, as you know, I would rather kill the cattle myself than send them to Smithfield.

Again,—What is the Royal Commission about? They have reported against Smithfield, and why don’t Government shut it up? Isn’t there Islington? Everything is ready there to open a market to-morrow. I can answer for that, for I was there yesterday and went over it. I inquired particularly about the drainage, for, if you remember, Brumpton told me they could not drain it. Well, perhaps they could not very conveniently when he was last there, but now they tell me that a thousand pounds would do the entire job. I’ll tell you how:—You see the market stands about fifty-one feet above the Trinity highwater mark of the Thames. Well, close by, in the Southgate road, there is a new sewer, that runs into a regular system of sewers which drain Hoxton, Spitalfields, and all that part down to London bridge—and the cattle market being eighteen feet above the level of the Southgate sewer, it will only be requisite to cut a culvert into it, for the entire space to be drained out and out.

Now, my last question is this: Why don’t the people belonging to the Islington market make the necessary sewer at once? If they did, what excuse could government have for not shutting up Smithfield, and moving the cattle market to Islington?

I am, Sir,
Yours to command,
T. BOVINGTON.

THE OLD CHURCHYARD TREE.

A PROSE POEM.

There is an old yew tree which stands by the wall in a dark quiet corner of the churchyard.

And a child was at play beneath its wide-spreading branches, one fine day in the early spring. He had his lap full of flowers, which the fields and lanes had supplied him with, and he was humming a tune to himself as he wove them into garlands.

And a little girl at play among the tombstones crept near to listen; but the boy was so intent upon his garland, that he did not hear the gentle footsteps, as they trod softly over the fresh green grass. When his work was finished, and all the flowers that were in his lap were woven together in one long wreath, he started up to measure its length upon the ground, and then he saw the little girl, as she stood with her eyes fixed upon him. He did not move or speak, but thought to himself that she looked very beautiful as she stood there with her flaxen ringlets hanging down upon her neck. The little girl was so startled by his sudden movement, that she let fall all the flowers she had collected in her apron, and ran away as fast as she could. But the boy was older and taller than she, and soon caught her, and coaxed her to come back and play with him, and help him to make more garlands; and from that time they saw each other nearly every day, and became great friends.

Twenty years passed away. Again, he was seated beneath the old yew tree in the churchyard.

It was summer now; bright, beautiful summer, with the birds singing, and the flowers covering the ground, and scenting the air with their perfume.

But he was not alone now, nor did the little girl steal near on tiptoe, fearful of being heard. She was seated by his side, and his arm was round her, and she looked up into his face, and smiled as she whispered: “The first evening of our lives we were ever together was passed here: we will spend the first evening of our wedded life in the same quiet, happy place.” And he drew her closer to him as she spoke.

The summer is gone; and the autumn; and twenty more summers and autumns have passed away since that evening, in the old churchyard.

A young man, on a bright moonlight night, comes reeling through the little white gate, and stumbling over the graves. He shouts and he sings, and is presently followed by others like unto himself, or worse. So, they all laugh at the dark solemn head of the yew tree, and throw stones up at the place where the moon has silvered the boughs.

Those same boughs are again silvered by the moon, and they droop over his mother’s grave. There is a little stone which bears this inscription:-

“HER HEART BRAKE IN SILENCE.”

But the silence of the churchyard is now broken by a voice—not of the youth—nor a voice of laughter and ribaldry.

“My son!—dost thou see this grave? and dost thou read the record in anguish, whereof may come repentance?”

“Of what should I repent?” answers the son; “and why should my young ambition for fame relax in its strength because my mother was old and weak?”

“Is this indeed our son?” says the father, bending in agony over the grave of his beloved.

“I can well believe I am not;” exclaimeth the youth. “It is well that you have brought me here to say so. Our natures are unlike; our courses must be opposite. Your way lieth here—mine yonder!”

So the son left the father kneeling by the grave.

Again a few years are passed. It is winter, with a roaring wind and a thick grey fog. The graves in the Churchyard are covered with snow, and there are great icicles in the Church-porch. The wind now carries a swathe of snow along the tops of the graves, as though the “sheeted dead” were at some melancholy play; and hark! the icicles fall with a crash and jingle, like a solemn mockery of the echo of the unseemly mirth of one who is now coming to his final rest.

There are two graves near the old yew tree; and the grass has overgrown them. A third is close by; and the dark earth at each side has just been thrown up. The bearers come; with a heavy pace they move along; the coffin heaveth up and down, as they step over the intervening graves.

Grief and old age had seized upon the father, and worn out his life; and premature decay soon seized upon the son, and gnawed away his vain ambition, and his useless strength, till he prayed to be borne, not the way yonder that was most opposite to his father and his mother, but even the same way they had gone—the way which leads to the Old Churchyard Tree.

SABBATH PARIAHS.

We are overwhelmed with “Chips” from letter-writers, letter-senders, letter-receivers, letter-sorters, and post-office clerks. Our own office has become a post-office. It would seem as if all the letters that ought to have been written for delivery on several previous Sundays in the ordinary course, and by the agency of the great establishment in St. Martin’s-le-Grand, have only not been indited in order that we might be the sufferers. Doubtless, the other channels of public information have equally received in the course of each week the surplus of what would have been, but for the Plumptre and Ashley obstruction, Sunday letters. The public are in arms, and every arm has a pen at the end; every pen is dipped in the blackest ink of indignation, or is tinged with the milder tint of remonstrance.

Our most desperate remonstrants are provincial post-office clerks; for it would appear that Lord Ashley’s outcasts from Sunday society have a worse chance of being received into it now than ever. Their labours are in many cases so heavy on Saturday nights, that they are obliged to lie in bed during the whole of church time on Sunday, to recover from their fatigues.

We select one from the heap, for publication. The writer gives a clear account of the hardships of a provincial post-office clerk before he was relieved from Sunday duty by the Royal mandate.

“Sir,

“For three years I was what you are pleased to call in your article on
the ‘Sunday Screw’ a Post-Office Pariah, at an office in a most
‘corresponding’ town; my Sunday duties were as follows:—at four I
rose, sorted my letters and newspapers, delivered them to the
messengers, sorted and stamped (both sides) the letters for the
cross-country mails, swept out and dusted the place, then I went to my
room again, had a nap, rose, washed, and dressed in my best; I came
down to breakfast at eight, took a walk, till Church time, and amused
myself till five in the afternoon, when I attended at the office and
received letters till half-past six.

“I usually attended divine service; at eight I sorted and stamped the
letters and dispatched the mails; at nine I had done my work; all this
I did myself and never dreamed of being assisted. The rush of business
is now, I understand, so great on the arrival of the Saturday
afternoon mails, that every assistant and Post-Office clerk will wish
Lord Ashley safely imprisoned in the Whited Sepulchres.

“Your, very obediently,
“EX-PARIAH.”

Judging from the tone in which the earnest remonstrances from all kinds of people that pile our tables are couched, we fear that, during the last few Sundays, the bulk of the disappointed public in the provinces has benefited very little by the change in a moral point of view. Vexation has, we fear, taken the place of that religious, calm, and beneficent state of mind in which the Sabbath ought to be passed. The object, therefore, of the promoters of the measure—increased veneration for the first day of the week—has failed; for of course their whole and sole object in the affair has been the furtherance of the cause of religion, and not a desire to get quits with Mr. Rowland Hill for the calm, manly, triumphant manner in which he caused truth to vanquish them in the recent agitation on the same question.

DUST;
OR UGLINESS REDEEMED.

On a murky morning in November, wind north-east, a poor old woman with a wooden leg was seen struggling against the fitful gusts of the bitter breeze, along a stony zigzag road full of deep and irregular cart-ruts. Her ragged petticoat was blue, and so was her wretched nose. A stick was in her left hand, which assisted her to dig and hobble her way along; and in her other hand, supported also beneath her withered arm, was a large rusty iron sieve. Dust and fine ashes filled up all the wrinkles in her face; and of these there were a prodigious number, for she was eighty-three years old. Her name was Peg Dotting.

About a quarter of a mile distant, having a long ditch and a broken-down fence as a foreground, there rose against the muddled-grey sky, a huge Dust-heap of a dirty black colour,—being, in fact, one of those immense mounds of cinders, ashes, and other emptyings from dust-holes and bins, which have conferred celebrity on certain suburban neighbourhoods of a great city. Towards this dusky mountain old Peg Dotting was now making her way.

Advancing towards the Dust-heap by an opposite path, very narrow and just reclaimed from the mud by a thick layer of freshly broken flints, there came at the same time Gaffer Doubleyear, with his bone-bag slung over his shoulder. The rags of his coat fluttered in the east-wind, which also whistled keenly round his almost rimless hat, and troubled his one eye. The other eye, having met with an accident last week, he had covered neatly with an oyster-shell, which was kept in its place by a string at each side, fastened through a hole. He used no staff to help him along, though his body was nearly bent double, so that his face was constantly turned to the earth, like that of a four-footed creature. He was ninety-seven years of age.

As these two patriarchal labourers approached the great Dust-heap, a discordant voice hallooed to them from the top of a broken wall. It was meant as a greeting of the morning, and proceeded from little Jem Clinker, a poor deformed lad whose back had been broken when a child. His nose and chin were much too large for the rest of his face, and he had lost nearly all his teeth from premature decay. But he had an eye gleaming with intelligence and life, and an expression at once patient and hopeful. He had balanced his misshapen frame on the top of the old wall, over which one shrivelled leg dangled, as if by the weight of a hob-nailed boot that covered a foot large enough for a ploughman.

In addition to his first morning’s salutation of his two aged friends, he now shouted out in a tone of triumph and self-gratulation, in which he felt assured of their sympathy—“Two white skins, and a tor’shell-un.”

It may be requisite to state that little Jem Clinker belonged to the dead-cat department of the Dust-heap, and now announced that a prize of three skins, in superior condition, had rewarded him for being first in the field. He was enjoying a seat on the wall in order to recover himself from the excitement of his good fortune.

At the base of the great Dust-heap the two old people now met their young friend—a sort of great-grandson by mutual adoption—and they at once joined the party who had by this time assembled as usual, and were already busy at their several occupations.

But besides all these, another individual, belonging to a very different class, formed a part of the scene, though appearing only on its outskirts. A canal ran along at the rear of the Dust-heap, and on the banks of its opposite side, slowly wandered by—with hands clasped and hanging down in front of him, and eyes bent vacantly upon his hands—the forlorn figure of a man in a very shabby great-coat, which had evidently once belonged to one in the position of a gentleman. And to a gentleman it still belonged—but in _what_ a position? A scholar, a man of wit, of high sentiment, of refinement, and a good fortune withal—now by a sudden “turn of law” bereft of the last only, and finding that none of the rest, for which (having his fortune) he had been so much admired, enabled him to gain a livelihood. His title-deeds had been lost or stolen, and so he was bereft of everything he possessed. He had talents, and such as would have been profitably available had he known how to use them for this new purpose; but he did not; he was misdirected; he made fruitless efforts, in his want of experience; and he was now starving. As he passed the great Dust-heap, he gave one vague, melancholy gaze that way, and then looked wistfully into the canal. And he continued to look into the canal as he slowly moved along, till he was out of sight.