Chapter I (1)

Viotti’s division of violin-playing into two great classes—good playing and bad playing—is applicable to Bank note making. The processes employed in manufacturing good Bank notes we have already described: we shall now cover a few pages with a faint outline of the various arts, stratagems, and contrivances employed in concocting bad Bank notes. The picture cannot be drawn with very distinct or strong markings. The tableaux from which it is copied are so intertwisted and complicated with clever, slippery, ingenious scoundrelism, that a finished chart of it would be worse than morally displeasing:—it would be tedious.

All arts require time and experience for their development. When anything great is to be done, first attempts are nearly always failures. The first Bank note forgery was no exception to this rule, and its story has a spice of romance in it. The affair has never been circumstantially told; but some research enables us to detail it:—

In the month of August, 1757, a gentleman living in the neighbourhood of Lincoln’s Inn Fields named Bliss, advertised for a clerk. There were, as was usual even at that time, many applicants; but the successful one was a young man of twenty-six, named Richard William Vaughan. His manners were so winning and his demeanour so much that of a gentleman (he belonged indeed to a good county family in Staffordshire, and had been a student at Pembroke Hall, Oxford), that Mr. Bliss at once engaged him. Nor had he occasion, during the time the new clerk served him, to repent the step. Vaughan was so diligent, intelligent, and steady, that not even when it transpired that he was, commercially speaking, “under a cloud,” did his master lessen confidence in him. Some enquiry into his antecedents showed that he had, while at College, been extravagant; that his friends had removed him thence; set him up in Stafford as a wholesale linen draper, with a branch establishment in Aldersgate Street, London; that he had failed, and that there was some difficulty about his certificate. But so well did he excuse his early failings and account for his misfortunes, that his employer did not check the regard he felt growing towards him. Their intercourse was not merely that of master and servant. Vaughan was a frequent guest at Bliss’s table; by-and-by a daily visitor to his wife, and—to his ward.

Miss Bliss was a young lady of some attractions, not the smallest of which was a handsome fortune. Young Vaughan made the most of his opportunities. He was well-looking, well-informed, dressed well, and evidently made love well, for he won the young lady’s heart. The guardian was not flinty hearted, and acted like a sensible man of the world. “It was not,” he said on a subsequent and painful occasion, “till I learned from the servants and observed by the girl’s behaviour that she greatly approved Richard Vaughan, that I consented; but on condition that he should make it appear that he could maintain her. I had no doubt of his character as a servant, and I knew his family were respectable. His brother is an eminent attorney.” Vaughan boasted that his mother (his father was dead), was willing to re-instate him in business with a thousand pounds; five hundred of which was to be settled upon Miss Bliss for her separate use.

So far all went on prosperously. Providing Richard Vaughan could attain a position satisfactory to the Blisses, the marriage was to take place on the Easter Monday following, which the Calendar tells us happened early in April, 1758. With this understanding, he left Mr. Bliss’s service, to push his fortune.

Months passed on, and Vaughan appears to have made no way in the world. He had not even obtained his bankrupt’s certificate. His visits to his affianced were frequent, and his protestations passionate; but he had effected nothing substantial towards a happy union. Miss Bliss’s guardian grew impatient; and, although there is no evidence to prove that the young lady’s affection for Vaughan was otherwise than deep and sincere, yet even she began to lose confidence in him. His excuses were evidently evasive, and not always true. The time fixed for the wedding was fast approaching; and Vaughan saw that something must be done to restore the young lady’s confidence.

About three weeks before the appointed Easter Tuesday, Vaughan went to his mistress in high spirits. All was right: his certificate was to be granted in a day or two; his family had come forward with the money, and he was to continue the Aldersgate business he had previously carried on as a branch of the Stafford trade. The capital he had waited so long for, was at length forthcoming. In fact, here were two hundred and forty pounds of the five hundred he was to settle on his beloved. Vaughan then produced twelve twenty-pound notes; Miss Bliss could scarcely believe her eyes. She examined them. The paper she remarked seemed rather thicker than usual. “Oh,” said Bliss, “all Bank bills are not alike.” The girl was naturally much pleased. She would hasten to apprise Mistress Bliss of the good news.

Not for the world! So far from letting any living soul know he had placed so much money in her hands, Vaughan exacted an oath of secresy from her, and sealed the notes up in a parcel with his own seal; making her swear that she would on no account open it till after their marriage.

Some days after, that is, “on the twenty-second of March,” (1758) we are describing the scene in Mr. Bliss’s own words—“I was sitting with my wife by the fireside. The prisoner and the girl were sitting in the same room—which was a small one—and although they whispered, I could distinguish that Vaughan was very urgent to have something returned which he had previously given to her. She refused, and Vaughan went away in an angry mood. I then studied the girl’s face, and saw that it expressed much dissatisfaction. Presently a tear broke out. I then spoke, and insisted on knowing the dispute. She refused to tell, and I told her that until she did, I would not see her. The next day I asked the same question of Vaughan; he hesitated. ‘Oh!’ I said, ‘I dare say it is some ten or twelve pound matter—something to buy a wedding bauble with.’ He answered that it was much more than that, it was near three hundred pounds! ‘But why all this secresy,’ I said; and he answered it was not proper for people to know he had so much money till his certificate was signed. I then asked him to what intent he had left the notes with the young lady? He said, as I had of late suspected him, he designed to give her a proof of his affection and truth. I said, ‘You have demanded them in such a way that it must be construed as an abatement of your affection towards her.’” Vaughan was again exceedingly urgent in asking back the packet; but Bliss remembering his many evasions, and supposing that this was a trick, declined advising his niece to restore the parcel without proper consideration. The very next day it was discovered that the notes were counterfeits.

This occasioned stricter enquiries into Vaughan’s previous career. It turned out that he bore the character in his native place of a dissipated and not very scrupulous person. The intention of his mother to assist him was an entire fabrication, and he had given Miss Bliss the forged notes solely for the purpose of deceiving her on that matter. Meanwhile the forgeries became known to the authorities, and he was arrested. By what means, does not clearly appear. The “Annual Register” says that one of the engravers gave information; but we find nothing in the newspapers of the time to support that statement; neither was it corroborated at Vaughan’s trial.

When Vaughan was arrested he thrust a piece of paper into his mouth, and began to chew it violently. It was, however, rescued, and proved to be one of the forged notes; fourteen of them were found on his person, and when his lodgings were searched twenty more were discovered.

Vaughan was tried at the Old Bailey on the seventh of April, before Lord Mansfield. The manner of the forgery was detailed minutely at the trial:—On the first of March (about a week before he gave the twelve notes to the young lady) Vaughan called on Mr. John Corbould, an engraver, and gave an order for a promissory note to be engraved with these words:—

“No. ——.

“I promise to pay to ——, or Bearer, ——, London ——.”

There was to be a Britannia in the corner. When it was done, Mr. Sneed (for that was the _alias_ Vaughan adopted) came again, but objected to the execution of the work. The Britannia was not good, and the words “I promise” were too near the edge of the plate. Another was in consequence engraved, and on the fourth of March Vaughan took it away. He immediately repaired to a printer, and had forty-eight impressions taken on thin paper, provided by himself. Meanwhile, he had ordered, on the same morning, of Mr. Charles Fourdrinier, another engraver, a second plate, with what he called “a direction,” in the words, “For the Governor and Company of the Bank of England.” This was done, and about a week later he brought some paper, each sheet “folded up,” said the witness, “very curiously, so that I could not see what was in them. I was going to take the papers from him, but he said he must go upstairs with me, and see them worked off himself. I took him upstairs; he would not let me have them out of his hands. I took a sponge and wetted them, and put them one by one on the plate in order for printing them. After my boy had done two or three of them, I went downstairs, and my boy worked the rest off, and the prisoner came down and paid me.”

Here the Court pertinently asked, “What imagination had you when a man thus came to you to print on secret paper, ‘the Governor and Company of the Bank of England?’”

The engraver’s reply was:—“I then did not suspect anything. But I shall take care for the future.” As this was the first Bank of England note forgery that was ever perpetrated, the engraver was held excused.

It may be mentioned as an evidence of the delicacy of the reporters that, in their account of the trial, Miss Bliss’s name is not mentioned. Her designation is “a young lady.” We subjoin the notes of her evidence:—

“A young lady (sworn). The prisoner delivered me some bills; these are the same (producing twelve counterfeit Bank notes sealed up in a cover, for twenty pounds each), said they were Bank bills. I said they were thicker paper—he said all bills are not alike. I was to keep them till after we were married. He put them into my hands to show he put confidence in me, and desired me not to show them to any body; sealed them up with his own seal, and obliged me by an oath not to discover them to any body. And I did not till he had discovered them himself. He was to settle so much in Stock on me.”

Vaughan urged in his defence that his sole object was to deceive his affianced, and that he intended to destroy all the notes after his marriage. But it had been proved that the prisoner had asked one John Ballingar to change first one, and then twenty of the notes; but which that person was unable to do. Besides, had his sole object been to dazzle Miss Bliss with his fictitious wealth, he would most probably have entrusted more, if not all the notes, to her keeping.

He was found guilty, and passed the day that had been fixed for his wedding, as a condemned criminal.

On the 11th May, 1758, Richard William Vaughan was executed at Tyburn. By his side, on the same gallows, there was another forger: William Boodgere, a military officer, who had forged a draught on an army agent named Calcroft, and expiated the offence with the first forger of Bank of England notes.

The gallows may seem hard measure to have meted out to Vaughan, when it is considered that none of his notes were negotiated and no person suffered by his fraud. Not one of the forty-eight notes, except the twelve delivered to Miss Bliss, had been out of his possession; indeed the imitation must have been very clumsily executed, and detection would have instantly followed any attempt to pass the counterfeits. There was no endeavour to copy the style of engraving on a real Bank note. That was left to the engraver; and as each sheet passed through the press twice, the words added at the second printing, “For the Governor and Company of the Bank of England,” could have fallen into their proper place on any one of the sheets, only by a miracle. But what would have made the forgery clear to even a superficial observer was the singular omission of the second “n” in the word England.[1]

Footnote 1:

Bad orthography was by no means uncommon in the most important
documents at that period; the days of the week, in the day-books of
the Bank of England itself, are spelt in a variety of ways.

The criticism on Vaughan’s note of a Bank clerk examined on the trial was:—“There is some resemblance, to be sure; but this mote” (that upon which the prisoner was tried) “is numbered thirteen thousand eight hundred and forty, and we never reach so high a number.” Besides there was no water-mark in the paper. The note of which a fac-simile appeared in our eighteenth number, and dated so early as 1699, has a regular design in the texture of the paper; showing that the water-mark is as old as the Bank notes themselves.

Vaughan was greatly commiserated. But despite the unskilfulness of the forgery, and the insignificant consequences which followed it, the crime was considered of too dangerous a character not to be marked, from its very novelty, with exemplary punishment. Hanging created at that time no remorse in the public mind, and it was thought necessary to set up Vaughan as a warning to all future Bank note forgers. The crime was too dangerous not to be marked with the severest penalties. Forgery differs from other crimes not less in the magnitude of the spoil it may obtain, and of the injury it inflicts, than in the facilities attending its accomplishment. The common thief finds a limit to his depredations in the bulkiness of his booty, which is generally confined to such property as he can carry about his person; the swindler raises insuperable and defeating obstacles to his frauds if the amount he seeks to obtain is so considerable as to awaken close vigilance or enquiry. To carry their projects to any very profitable extent, these criminals are reduced to the hazardous necessity of acting in concert, and thus infinitely increasing the risks of detection. But the forger need have no accomplice; he is burdened with no bulky and suspicious property; he needs no receiver to assist his contrivances. The skill of his own individual right hand can command thousands; often with the certainty of not being detected, and oftener with such rapidity as to enable him to baffle the pursuit of justice.

It was a long time before Vaughan’s rude attempt was improved upon: but in the same year, (1758), another department of the crime was commenced with perfect success;—namely, an ingenious alteration, for fraudulent purposes, of real Bank notes. A few months after Vaughan’s execution, one of the northern mails was stopped and robbed by a highwayman; several Bank notes were comprised in the spoil, and the robber, setting up with these as a gentleman, went boldly to the Hatfield Post office, ordered a chaise and four, rattled away down the road, and changed a note at every change of horses. The robbery was, of course, soon made known, and the numbers and dates of the stolen notes were advertised as having been stopped at the Bank. To the genius of a highwayman this offered but a small obstacle, and the gentleman-thief changed all the figures “1” he could find into “4’s.” These notes passed currently enough; but, on reaching the Bank, the alteration was detected, and the last holder was refused payment. As that person had given a valuable consideration for the note, he brought an action for the recovery of the amount; and at the trial it was ruled by the Lord Chief Justice, that “any person paying a valuable consideration for a Bank note, payable to bearer, in a fair course of business, has an understood right to receive the money of the Bank.”

It took a quarter of a century to bring the art of forging Bank notes to perfection. In 1779, this was nearly attained by an ingenious gentleman named Mathison, a watchmaker, from the matrimonial village of Gretna Green. Having learnt the arts of engraving and of simulating signatures, he tried his hand at the notes of the Darlington Bank; but, with the confidence of skill, was not cautious in passing them, was suspected, and absconded to Edinburgh. Scorning to let his talent be wasted, he favoured the Scottish public with many spurious Royal Bank of Scotland notes, and regularly forged his way by their aid to London. At the end of February he took handsome lodgings in the Strand, opposite Arundel Street. His industry was remarkable; for, by the 12th of March, he had planed and polished rough pieces of copper, engraved them, forged the water-mark, printed and negotiated several impressions. His plan was to travel and to purchase articles in shops. He bought a pair of shoe-buckles at Coventry with a forged note, which was eventually detected at the Bank of England. He had got so bold that he paid such frequent visits in Threadneedle Street that the Bank clerks became familiar with his person. He was continually changing notes of one, for another denomination. These were his originals, which he procured to make spurious copies of. One day seven thousand pounds came in from the Stamp Office. There was a dispute about one of the notes. Mathison, who was present, though at some distance, declared, oracularly, that the note was a good one. How could he know so well? A dawn of suspicion arose in the minds of the clerks; one trail led into another, and Mathison was finally apprehended. So well were his notes forged that, on the trial, an experienced Bank clerk declared he could not tell whether the note handed him to examine was forged or not. Mathison offered to reveal his secret of forging the water-mark, if mercy were shown to him; this was refused, and he suffered the penalty of his crime.

Mathison was a genius in his criminal way, but a greater than he appeared in 1786. In that year perfection seemed to have been reached. So considerable was the circulation of spurious paper-money that it appeared as if some unknown power had set up a bank of its own. Notes were issued from it, and readily passed current, in hundreds and thousands. They were not to be distinguished from the genuine paper of Threadneedle Street. Indeed, when one was presented there, in due course, so complete were all its parts; so masterly the engraving; so correct the signatures; so skilful the water-mark, that it was promptly paid; and only discovered to be a forgery when it reached a particular department. From that period forged paper continued to be presented, especially at the time of lottery drawing. Consultations were held with the police. Plans were laid to help detection. Every effort was made to trace the forger. Clarke, the best detective of his day, went, like a sluth-hound, on the track; for in those days the expressive word “blood-money” was known. Up to a certain point there was little difficulty; but beyond that, consummate art defied the ingenuity of the officer. In whatever way the notes came, the train of discovery always paused at the lottery-offices. Advertisements offering large rewards were circulated; but the unknown forger baffled detection.

While this base paper was in full currency, there appeared an advertisement in the Daily Advertiser for a servant. The successful applicant was a young man, in the employment of a musical-instrument maker; who, some time after, was called upon by a coachman, and informed that the advertiser was waiting in a coach to see him. The young man was desired to enter the conveyance, where he beheld a person with something of the appearance of a foreigner, sixty or seventy years old, apparently troubled with the gout. A camlet surtout was buttoned round his mouth; a large patch was placed over his left eye; and nearly every part of his face was concealed. He affected much infirmity. He had a faint hectic cough; and invariably presented the patched side to the view of the servant. After some conversation—in the course of which he represented himself as guardian to a young nobleman of great fortune—the interview concluded with the engagement of the applicant; and the new servant was directed to call on Mr. Brank, at 29, Titchfield Street, Oxford Street. At this interview Brank inveighed against his whimsical ward for his love of speculating in lottery-tickets; and told the servant that his principal duty would be to purchase them. After one or two meetings, at each of which Brank kept his face muffled, he handed a forty and twenty pound Bank note; told the servant to be very careful not to lose them; and directed him to buy lottery-tickets at separate offices. The young man fulfilled his instructions, and at the moment he was returning, was suddenly called by his employer from the other side of the street, congratulated on his rapidity, and then told to go to various other offices in the neighbourhood of the Royal Exchange, and to purchase more shares. Four hundred pounds in Bank of England Notes were handed him, and the wishes of the mysterious Mr. Brank were satisfactorily effected. These scenes were continually enacted. Notes to a large amount were thus circulated; lottery-tickets purchased; and Mr. Brank—always in a coach, with his face studiously concealed—was ever ready on the spot to receive them. The surprise of the servant was somewhat excited; but had he known that from the period he left his master to purchase the tickets, one female figure accompanied all his movements; that when he entered the offices, it waited at the door, peered cautiously in at the window, hovered around him like a second shadow, watched him carefully, and never left him until once more he was in the Company of his employer—that surprise would have been greatly increased.[2] Again and again were these extraordinary scenes rehearsed. At last the Bank obtained a clue, and the servant was taken into custody. The directors imagined that they had secured the actor of so many parts; that the flood of forged notes which had inundated that establishment would at length be dammed up at his source. Their hopes proved fallacious, and it was found that “Old Patch,” (as the mysterious forger was, from the servant’s description, nick-named) had been sufficiently clever to baffle the Bank directors. The house in Titchfield Street was searched; but Mr. Brank had deserted it, and not a trace of a single implement of forgery was to be seen.

Footnote 2:

Francis’s History of the Bank of England.

All that could be obtained was some little knowledge of “Old Patch’s” proceedings. It appeared that he carried on his paper coining entirely by himself. His only confidant was his mistress. He was his own engraver. He even made his own ink. He manufactured his own paper. With a private press he worked his own notes; and counterfeited the signatures of the cashiers, completely. But these discoveries had no effect; for it became evident that Mr. Patch had set up a press elsewhere. Although his secret continued as impenetrable, his notes became as plentiful as ever. Five years of unbounded prosperity ought to have satisfied him; but it did not. Success seemed to pall him. His genius was of that insatiable order which demands new excitements, and a constant succession of new flights. The following paragraph from a newspaper of 1786 relates to the same individual:—

“On the 17th of December, ten pounds was paid into the Bank, for which the clerk, as usual, gave a ticket to receive a Bank note of equal value. This ticket ought to have been carried immediately to the cashier, instead of which the bearer took it home, and curiously added an 0 to the original sum, and returning, presented it so altered to the cashier, for which he received a note of one hundred pounds. In the evening, the clerks found a deficiency in the accounts; and on examining the tickets of the day, not only that but two others were discovered to have been obtained in the same manner. In the one, the figure 1 was altered to 4, and in another to 5, by which the artist received, upon the whole, nearly one thousand pounds.”

To that princely felony, Old Patch, as will be seen in the sequel, added smaller misdemeanors which one would think were far beneath his notice; except to convince himself and his mistress of the unbounded facility of his genius for fraud.

At that period the affluent public were saddled with a tax on plate; and many experiments were made to evade it. Among others, one was invented by a Mr. Charles Price, a stock-jobber and lottery-office keeper, which, for a time, puzzled the tax-gatherer. Mr. Charles Price lived in great style, gave splendid dinners, and did everything on the grandest scale. Yet Mr. Charles Price had no plate! The authorities could not find so much as a silver tooth-pick on his magnificent premises. In truth, what he was too cunning to possess, he borrowed. For one of his sumptuous entertainments, he hired the plate of a silversmith in Cornhill, and left the value in bank notes as security for its safe return. One of these notes having proved a forgery, was traced to Mr. Charles Price; and Mr. Charles Price was not to be found at that particular juncture. Although this excited no surprise—for he was often an absentee from his office for short periods—yet in due course and as a formal matter of business, an officer was set to find him, and to ask his explanation regarding the false note. After tracing a man who he had a strong notion was Mr. Charles Price through countless lodgings and innumerable disguises, the officer (to use his own expression) “nabbed” Mr. Charles Price. But, as Mr. Clarke observed, his prisoner and his prisoner’s lady were even then “too many” for him; for although he lost not a moment in trying to secure the forging implements, after he had discovered that Mr. Charles Price, and Mr. Brank, and Old Patch, were all concentrated in the person of his prisoner, he found the lady had destroyed every trace of evidence. Not a vestige of the forging factory was left. Not the point of a graver, nor a single spot of ink, nor a shred of silver paper, nor a scrap of anybody’s handwriting, was to be met with. Despite, however, this paucity of evidence to convict him, Mr. Charles Price had not the courage to face a jury, and eventually he saved the judicature and the Tyburn executive much trouble and expense, by hanging himself in Bridewell.

The success of Mr. Charles Price has never been surpassed; and even after the darkest era in the history of Bank forgeries—which dates from the suspension of cash payments, in February, 1797, and which will be treated of in a succeeding paper—“Old Patch” was still remembered as the Cæsar of Forgers.

THE TWO GUIDES OF THE CHILD.

A spirit near me said, “Look forth upon the Land of Life. What do you see?”

“Steep mountains, covered by a mighty plain, a table-land of many-coloured beauty. Beauty, nay, it seems all beautiful at first, but now I see that there are some parts barren.”

“Are they quite barren?—look more closely still!”

“No, in the wildest deserts, now, I see some gum-dropping acacias, and the crimson blossom of the cactus. But there are regions that rejoice abundantly in flower and fruit; and now, O Spirit, I see men and women moving to and fro.”

“Observe them, mortal.”

“I behold a world of love; the men have women’s arms entwined about them; some upon the verge of precipices—friends are running to the rescue. There are many wandering like strangers, who know not their road, and they look upward. Spirit, how many, many eyes are looking up as if to God! Ah, now I see some strike their neighbours down into the dust; I see some wallowing like swine; I see that there are men and women brutal.”

“Are they quite brutal?—look more closely still.”

“No, I see prickly sorrow growing out of crime, and penitence awakened by a look of love. I see good gifts bestowed out of the hand of murder, and see truth issue out of lying lips. But in this plain, O Spirit, I see regions—wide, bright regions,—yielding fruit and flower, while others seem perpetually veiled with fogs, and in them no fruit ripens. I see pleasant regions where the rock is full of clefts, and people fall into them. The men who dwell beneath the fog deal lovingly, and yet they have small enjoyment in the world around them, which they scarcely see. But whither are these women going?”

“Follow them.”

“I have followed down the mountains to a haven in the vale below. All that is lovely in the world of flowers makes a fragrant bed for the dear children; birds singing, they breathe upon the pleasant air; the butterflies play with them. Their limbs shine white among the blossoms, and their mothers come down full of joy to share their innocent delight. They pelt each other with the lilies of the valley. They call up at will fantastic masques, grim giants play to make them merry, a thousand grotesque loving phantoms kiss them; to each the mother is the one thing real, the highest bliss—the next bliss is the dream of all the world beside. Some that are motherless, all mother’s love. Every gesture, every look, every odour, every song, adds to the charm of love which fills the valley. Some little figures fall and die, and on the valley’s soil they crumble into violets and lilies, with love-tears to hang in them like dew.

“Who dares to come down with a frown into this happy valley? A severe man seizes an unhappy, shrieking child, and leads it to the roughest ascent of the mountain. He will lead it over steep rocks to the plain of the mature. On ugly needle-points he makes the child sit down, and teaches it its duty in the world above.”

“Its duty, mortal! do you listen to the teacher?”

“Spirit, I hear now. The child is informed about two languages spoken by nations extinct centuries ago, and something also, O Spirit, about the base of a hypothenuse.”

“Does the child attend?”

“Not much; but it is beaten sorely, and its knees are bruised against the rocks, till it is hauled up, woe-begone and weary, to the upper plain. It looks about bewildered; all is strange,—it knows not how to act. Fogs crown the barren mountain paths. Spirit, I am unhappy; there are many children thus hauled up, and as young men upon the plain; they walk in fog, or among brambles; some fall into pits; and many, getting into flower-paths, lie down and learn. Some become active, seeking right, but ignorant of what right is; they wander among men out of their fog-land, preaching folly. Let me go back among the children.”

“Have they no better guide?”

“Yes, now there comes one with a smiling face, and rolls upon the flowers with the little ones, and they are drawn to him. And he has magic spells to conjure up glorious spectacles of fairy land. He frolics with them and might be first cousin to the butterflies. He wreathes their little heads with flower garlands, and with his fairy land upon his lips he walks toward the mountains; eagerly they follow. He seeks the smoothest upward path, and that is but a rough one, yet they run up merrily, guide and children, butterflies pursuing still the flowers as they nod over a host of laughing faces. They talk of the delightful fairy world, and resting in the shady places learn of the yet more delightful world of God. They learn to love the Maker of the Flowers, to know how great the Father of the Stars must be, how good must be the Father of the Beetle. They listen to the story of the race they go to labour with upon the plain, and love it for the labour it has done. They learn old languages of men, to understand the past—more eagerly they learn the voices of the men of their own day, that they may take part with the present. And in their study when they flag, they fall back upon thoughts of the Child Valley they are leaving. Sports and fancies are the rod and spur that bring them with new vigour to the lessons. When they reach the plain they cry, ‘We know you, men and women; we know to what you have aspired for centuries; we know the love there is in you; we know the love there is in God; we come prepared to labour with you, dear, good friends. We will not call you clumsy when we see you tumble, we will try to pick you up; when we fall, you shall pick us up. We have been trained to love, and therefore we can aid you heartily, for love is labour!’”

The Spirit whispered, “You have seen and you have heard. Go now, and speak unto your fellow-men: ask justice for the child.”

To-day should love To-morrow, for it is a thing of hope; let the young Future not be nursed by Care. God gave not fancy to the child that men should stamp its blossoms down into the loose soil of intellect. The child’s heart was not made full to the brim of love, that men should pour its love away, and bruise instead of kiss the trusting innocent. Love and fancy are the stems on which we may graft knowledge readily. What is called by some dry folks a solid foundation may be a thing not desirable. To cut down all the trees and root up all the flowers in a garden, to cover walks and flower-beds alike with a hard crust of well-rolled gravel, that would be to lay down your solid foundation after a plan which some think good in a child’s mind, though not quite worth adopting in a garden. O, teacher, love the child and learn of it; so let it love and learn of you.

CHIPS.

EASY SPELLING AND HARD READING.

An interesting case of educational destitution presents itself in the following letter. It is written by the son of a poor, but honest, brickmaker of Hammersmith, who emigrated to Sidney, and is now a shepherd at Bathurst. While the facts it contains are clearly stated, and the sentiments expressed are highly creditable to the writer—showing that his moral training had not been neglected by his parents—the orthography is such as, we may safely affirm, would not have emanated from any human being with similar abilities, and in a similar station, than an Englishman.

England stands pre-eminent in this respect. The parents of this letter-writer were too poor to _pay_ to have their child taught, and consequently with the best will in the world to be an ordinary scholar, he is unable to spell. The clever manner in which such letters are selected as represent the sounds he is in the habit of giving to each word, shows an aptitude which would assuredly have made with the commonest cultivation a literate and useful citizen. More amusing orthography we have no where met; but the information it conveys is of the most useful kind. The reader will perceive that the points touched upon are precisely those respecting which he would wish to be informed; were he about to emigrate.

The epistle not only gives a truthful picture of an Australian shepherd’s condition, but is in itself a lesson and a censure on that want of national means of education from which at least one-third of the adult population of England suffer, and of which the writer is an especial victim and example:—

“Deer mother and father and sisters i root thes few lines hooping to
find you All well for I arr in gudd halth my self and i wood root
befor onley i wos very un setled and now i have root i houp you will
rite back as soon as you can and send how you all arr and likwise our
frends and i am hired my self for a sheeprd 12 munts for 19 pound and
my keep too for it wos to soun for our work when i arive in the cuntry
it is a plesent and a helthay cuntry and most peple dows well in it as
liks onley it is a grait cuntry for durnkerds and you do not Xpket for
them to do well no weer i have not got any folt to find of the cuntry
for after few theres man can bee is own master if hee liks for the
wagers is higher then tha arr at hom and the previshen is seeper and
peple do not work so hard as thay do at tom and if any wne wish to com
com at wonce and don with it same as i did and take no feer oof the
see whot ever for i did not see any danger whot ever and it is a
cuntry that puur peapole can get a gud living in hoostlue wich thay
can not at tom i arr vrey well plesed off the cuntry and i should bee
very happy if i had som relishon over with mee and i am 230 miles up
the cuntry and wee had a very plesent voyge over in deed and likwise
luckey and vrey litle sickenss and no deths deer mother and father i
houp you will lett our frends no how i am geeting on and der frends
you take no heed what pepole says about horstler take and past your
own thouths about it and if any body wishes to com i wood swade them
to com con pepole can geet a gud living there wer tha cant at tome and
pepole beter com and geet a belly full then to stop at tome and work
day and night then onely get haf a bely ful and i am shuur that no
body can not find any folt off the cuntry eXcep tis pepole do not now
when tha arr doing well [price of pervison] tee lb 1_s_ to 3_s_ suuger
lb 2_d_ to 6_d_ coofe lb 8_d_ to 1_s_ bred lb 1_d_ to 2_d_ beef lb
1_d_ to 2_d_ mutten ditto baken lb 6_d_ to 1_s._ poork lb 2_d_ to 4_d_
butter lb _6_d to 1_s_ chees lb 4_d_ to 8_d_ pertos price as tome sope
lb 4_d_ to 6_d_ starch and blue and sooder home price candles lb 4_d_
to 6_d_ rice lb 2_d_ to 4_d_ hags hom price trekle lb 4_d_ to 5_d_
solt lb 1_d_ peper nounc 2_d_ tabaker lb 1_s_ to 6_s_ beer 4_d_ pot at
sednay and up in the pool 1_s_ spirts hom price frut happles pars
horengs lemns peshes gusbryes curneth cheerys cokelnut storbyes
rasberys nuts of all sorts vegtbles of all sorts price of cloths much
the same as tome stok very resneble sheep 2_s_ 6_d_ heed wait about 80
pounds fat bullket about 1000 wit 3_l_ pour hors from 2_l_ to 10_l_
ther is wonderful grait many black in the cuntry but tha will not hurt
any one if you will let them aolne.

traitment on bord ship,

wee arive in the 7 febery and sailed to graveshend then wee stop ther
2 days then wee sailed from ther to plymeth and wee stop ther 9 days
and took in loot more emigrant then wee sailed from ther to seednay we
arive to seednay 8 of June wee had it vry ruf in the bay of biskey and
three mor places beside but i did not see any dainger of sinking not
the lest for wee had a vry plesent voyges over in deed the pervison on
bord ship Monday pork haf pound pea haf pint butter 6 ounces weekly
tea 1 ounce per week 9 ounces daily biscuit Tusday beef haf pound rice
4 ounces flour 1 pound per week Wendesday pork haf pound peas haf pint
raisins haf pound per week cooffee 1 ounce and haf per week Thursday
preserved meet haf pound Friday pork haf pound peas haf pint Sadurday
beef haf pound rice 4 ounces sugar three Quarter pound per week Sunday
preserved meat haf pound fresh woter three Quarrts daily vinegar haf
pint per week Mustard haf ounce per week salt tow ounces per week lime
Juse haf pint per week my der sisters i houp you will keep your selvs
from all bad company for it is a disgrace to all frends and likwise
worse for you own sellvs o rember that opinted day to com at last tis
behoups that wee shal bee free from all dets o whot a glorious tirm it
will bee then wee shal feel no more pains nor gref nor sorows nor
sickness nor truble of any cind o whot a glorious term it will bee
then o seeners kip your selvs out off the mire for feer you shuld sink
to the bootem the sarvents wagars of houstler tha geets ges haf as
much mour as tha gets at tome and my sister Maryaan shee kood geet 16
punds a year and Sarah get 20 pound and Marther get 8 or 9 pound and
tha arr not so sharp to the servents as tha arr at tome i houp you
will send word wot the yungest child name is and how it is geeting on
and send the date when it wos born and i houp this will find you all
weel and cumfortble to. J. R.”

A VERY OLD SOLDIER.

The following is a chip from a block whence we have already taken a few shavings:—“Kohl’s Travels in the Netherlands.” It describes the National Hospital for the Aged at Brussels. Some of the inmates whom he found in it, though still alive, belong to history. It must have been with a sort of archaic emotion that our inquisitive friend found himself speaking to a man who had escorted Marie Antoinette from Vienna to Paris, on the occasion of her marriage!

“The magnitude of the _Hospice des Vieillards_ in Brussels,” says Mr. Kohl, “fully realises the idea of a National establishment. The building itself fulfils all the required conditions of extent, solidity, and convenience. The gardens, court-yards, and apartments are spacious and well arranged. The sleeping and eating rooms are large, and well furnished; and it is pleasing to observe, here and there, the walls adorned with pictures painted in oil-colours. The inmates of this _Hospice_ pass their latter days in the enjoyment of a degree of happiness and comfort which would be unattainable in their own homes. The chapel is situated only at the distance of a few paces from the main building, and is connected with it by means of a roofed corridor; thus obviating the difficulties which prevent old people from attending places of public worship when, as it frequently happens, they are situated at long and inaccessible distances from their dwellings. In winter the Chapel of the _Hospice_ is carefully warmed and secured against damp.

“At the time of my visit to the _Hospice des Vieillards_ in Brussels, the establishment contained about seven hundred inmates, of both sexes, between the ages of seventy and eighty. Of this number six hundred and fifteen were maintained at the charge of the establishment, and seventy-five, being in competent circumstances, defrayed their own expenses. That the number of those able to maintain themselves should bear so considerable a relative proportion to the rest, is a fact which bears strong testimony in favour of the merits of the establishment. Those who support themselves live in a style more or less costly, according to the amount of their respective payments. Some of the apartments into which I was conducted certainly presented such an air of comfort that persons, even of a superior condition of life, could scarcely have desired better.

“I learned from the Governor of the _Hospice_ that the average cost of the maintenance of each individual was about seventy-five centimes per day, making a total diurnal expenditure of six hundred francs, or of two hundred thousand francs per annum. But as this estimate includes the wages of attendants and the expenses consequent on repairs of the building, it may fairly be calculated that each individual costs about three hundred francs per annum. The _Hospice_ frequently receives liberal donations and bequests from opulent private persons.

“For such of the pensioners as are able to work, employment is provided: others are appointed to fill official posts in the veteran Republic. Now and then a little task-work is imposed; but the _Hospice_ being rich, this duty is not exacted with the precision requisite in establishments for the young, where the inmates having a long worldly career before them, it is desirable that they should be trained in habits of regularity and industry. The pensioners of the Brussels _Hospice des Vieillards_, enjoy much freedom; and they are even allowed some amusements and indulgences, which it might not be proper to concede to young persons. For example, they are permitted to play at cards; but it will scarcely be said there is anything objectionable in such an indulgence to old persons who have run out their worldly course; for even were they fated once more to enter into society, their example could neither be very useful nor very dangerous. Here and there I observed groups of the pensioners, male and female, seated at cards, staking their pocket-money, of which each has a small allowance, on the hazard of the game. The penalties assigned for misdemeanours are very mild, consisting merely in the offending party being prohibited from going out, or, as it is called, _la privée de la sortie_. In extreme cases the delinquent is confined to his or her own apartment.

“It has seldom been my lot to visit a charitable institution, which created in my mind so many pleasing impressions as those I experienced in the Hospital for the Old in Brussels. It was gratifying to observe in the spacious court-yards the cheerful and happy groups of grey-haired men and women, sunning themselves in the open air. Some were playing at cards, whilst here and there the females were seated at work, and men sauntering about smoking their pipes and gossiping. Every now and then I met an old man whistling or singing whilst he paced to and fro. More than one of these veterans had been eye-witnesses of interesting historical events, which now belong to a past age. Several of them had served as soldiers during the Austrian dominion in Belgium. Of these the porter of the Hospital was one.

“The most remarkable character in the whole establishment was an old Dutchman, named Jan Hermann Jankens, who was born at Leyden in the year 1735. At the time when I saw him, he was one hundred and nine years of age; or, to quote his own description of himself, he was ‘_leste, vaillant, et sain_.’”

“Il nous rapelle en vain
Apres un siècle de séjour,
Ses plaisirs ainsi que ses amertumes.”

“These lines were inscribed beneath his portrait, which hung in his own apartment. I remarked that the painter had not flattered him. ‘You are right, Sir,’ replied he; ‘the fact is, I am much younger than my portrait,’ and to prove that he was making no vain boast, he sprang up, and cut several capers, with surprising agility. His faculties were unimpaired, and he was a remarkable example of that vigorous organisation which sometimes manifests itself in the human frame; and which excites our wonder when we find that such delicate structures as the nerves of sight and hearing may be used for the space of a century without wearing out. Until within two years of the time when I saw Jankens, he had been able to work well and actively. His hand was firm and steady, and he frequently wrote letters to his distant friends. When in his one hundred and seventh year, he thought, very reasonably, that he might give up work. ‘And what do you do now?’ I enquired. ‘I enjoy my life,’ replied he; ‘I saunter about the whole day long, singing, smoking, and amusing myself. I spend my time very gaily!’

“‘Yes, Sir; he dances, drinks, and sings all day long!’ exclaimed, in a half-jeering, half-envious tone, another veteran, named Watermans, who had joined us, and who, though _only_ ninety years of age, was much more feeble than Jankens.

“I learned from the latter that he had had fifteen children; but that of all his large family, only one survived, though most of them had lived to a goodly age. His memory was stored with recollections of events connected with the marriage of Louis the Sixteenth; for, when a soldier in the Austrian service, he had formed one of the military escort which conducted Marie Antoinette into France. He sang me an old song, which had been composed in honour of the Royal nuptials, and which he said was very popular at the time. It was in the usual style of such effusions; a mere string of hyperbolic compliments, in praise of the ‘beauteous Princess,’ and the ‘illustrious Prince.’ It sounded like an echo from the grave of old French loyalty. Jankens sang this song in a remarkably clear, strong voice; but nevertheless, the performance did not give satisfaction to old Watermans, who, thrusting his fingers into his ears, said peevishly, ‘What a croaking noise!’

“Heedless of this discouraging remark, the venerable centenarian was preparing to favour me with another specimen of his vocal ability, when the great bell in the court-yard rang for supper. ‘Pardon, Sir,’ said Jankens, with an apologetic bow, ‘but—supper.’ Whereupon he hurried off in the direction of the refectory, with that sort of eager yearning with which it might be imagined he turned to his mother’s breast one hundred and nine years before.

“‘It is amazing that that old fellow should have so sharp an appetite,’ observed the petulant Watermans, hobbling after him in a way which showed that he too was not altogether unprepared to do honour to the evening meal.”

This Hospital for the Aged is a sort of National Almshouse not solely peculiar to Belgium. Private munificence does in England what is done abroad by Governments; but it is to be deplored that a more general provision for the superannuated does not exist in this country. Workhouses are indeed asylums for the old; but for those who are also decayed in worldly circumstances, they cannot afford those comforts which old age requires. Except Greenwich Hospital for sailors, and Chelsea Hospital for soldiers, we have no national institution for old people.

THE HOUSEHOLD JEWELS.

A Traveller, from journeying
In countries far away,
Re-passed his threshold at the close
Of one calm Sabbath day;
A voice of love, a comely face,
A kiss of chaste delight,
Were the first things to welcome him
On that blest Sabbath night.

He stretched his limbs upon the hearth,
Before its friendly blaze,
And conjured up mixed memories
Of gay and gloomy days;
And felt that none of gentle soul,
However far he roam,
Can e’er forego, can e’er forget,
The quiet joys of home.

“Bring me my children!” cried the sire,
With eager, earnest tone;
“I long to press them, and to mark
How lovely they have grown;
Twelve weary months have passed away
Since I went o’er the sea,
To feel how sad and lone I was
Without my babes and thee.”

“Refresh thee, as ’tis needful,” said
The fair and faithful wife,
The while her pensive features paled,
And stirred with inward strife;
“Refresh thee, husband of my heart,
I ask it as a boon;
Our children are reposing, love;
Thou shalt behold them soon.”

She spread the meal, she filled the cup,
She pressed him to partake;
He sat down blithely at the board,
And all for her sweet sake;
But when the frugal feast was done,
The thankful prayer preferred,
Again affection’s fountain flowed;
Again its voice was heard.

“Bring me my children, darling wife,
I’m in an ardent mood;
My soul lacks purer aliment,
I long for other food;
Bring forth my children to my gaze,
Or ere I rage or weep,
I yearn to kiss their happy eyes
Before the hour of sleep.”