Part 4

For even private friendship is not held sacred. There was living in Naples, upwards of a year since, a Count Montinona, who appeared to have no particular object in view except the pursuit of pleasure. For many years he had lavished his bounty and his friendship on another, who was at length discovered to have made somewhat free with the Count’s property; accusations ensued, and, though compassion and a certain lingering recollection of the past did not permit the Count to cast the villain entirely off; yet he so far restricted his intimacy as to put it out of his power to rob him--“he was poor, and the temptation had been too great!” But what ensued?--This man denounced his friend as having concealed arms, and as entertaining free and dangerous opinions. Straightway the Count was arrested--his house and papers were examined, though nothing could be found to implicate him or to prove the charge; yet for many, many months he pined away in prison. I never heard when he was released, or if he is yet at liberty. All that time the informer ranged about at his own sweet will, to entrap as many new jail victims as he could make.

The effect of the Spy System on the national character is exceedingly demoralising. There is no country in Europe where the low, secret vices, as opposed to those of a bolder, opener, and more ferocious character, exist so strongly as in the South of Italy. There, the result of that timidity and want of faith in what is good, and just, and true, which has been engendered by intrigue, is practised in its most comprehensive sense. The Secret Police system is one of the very many causes of this. To appreciate this thoroughly, you must regard it as being not merely a political institution, but as having now become national; people have followed the example which has been set them, and have all become spies--spies on each other’s actions, words, and thoughts. Sometimes this habit is pursued to the extent only of simple curiosity, watching, investigating, and reporting the commonest trifles. Sometimes it is a little more malignant, and engages, almost as a pastime, in embroiling individuals or families. Sometimes it pushes further, and furnishes denunciations to the Priest, the Bishop, the Intendente, or the Minister. I have seen it under all its phases, and the effect has been to produce a want of faith in all that is high, generous and noble, and to form a low national character.

It is more ridiculous and annoying than can well be imagined, to get behind the scenes of Italian life, and listen to the daily gossip:--How such an one “_ha fatto un’ ricorso_” against this or that person. How Don So and So has written certain letters to the Intendente, containing charges against another Don, and has forged two signatures. How So and So has been to the bishop and laid a long list of crimes at the door of some luckless priest. Then watch the tempest of official papers which fly through the air; some contain inquiries into the truth of the statements, addressed to the judge or the syndic; some are orders to a dozen unfortunate wights to present themselves at the Intendenza; while others contain ghostly reproofs from the bishop, or orders to suspend a priest at his reverence’s will and pleasure, and rusticate him in some monastery. Every denunciation is received and inquired into.

I remember an instance of two men who kept a whole district in inquietude during one winter. Both had received some private offence, and straightway each shrank into a corner and wove his envenomed meshes; charges were devised and letters written to the Intendente, accusing some score of their friends of Carbonarism or constitutionalism; then came the usual dispatches to the judge and other authorities to inquire into the truth of the statements. The judge, it happened, was friendly with the unfortunate denounced, and drew up therefore a favourable report, but had he been less honest or less amicable, these poor fellows might have swelled the number of those who now pine in the prisons of the Vicaria.

Indeed, the influence of the Police Spy System (united with other causes), has been such as to convert the whole nation into spies upon each other. As suspicion and want of confidence universally prevail, so there is a deficiency of truthfulness. This cannot be more strongly proved than by the admission of the Italians themselves who, when wishing to conciliate your belief, tell you that they speak “_la parola Inglese_,”--on the word of an Englishman.

CHIPS.

THE INDIVIDUALITY OF LOCOMOTIVES.

It is a remarkable truth, and, well applied, it might be profitable to us, in helping us to make fair allowance for the differences between the temperaments of different men--that every Locomotive Engine running on a Railway, has a distinct individuality and character of its own.

It is perfectly well known to experienced practical engineers, that if a dozen different Locomotive Engines were made, at the same time, of the same power, for the same purpose, of like materials, in the same Factory--each of those Locomotive Engines would come out with its own peculiar whims and ways, only ascertainable by experience. One engine will take a great meal of coke and water at once; another will not hear of such a thing, but will insist on being coaxed by spades-full and buckets-full. One is disposed to start off, when required, at the top of his speed; another must have a little time to warm at his work, and to get well into it. These peculiarities are so accurately mastered by skilful drivers, that only particular men can persuade particular engines to do their best. It would seem as if some of these “excellent monsters” declared, on being brought out of the stable, “If it’s Smith who is to drive me, I won’t go. If it’s my friend Stokes, I am agreeable to anything!”

All Locomotive Engines are low-spirited in damp and foggy weather. They have a great satisfaction in their work when the air is crisp and frosty. At such a time they are very cheerful and brisk; but they strongly object to haze and Scotch mists. These are points of character on which they are all united. It is in their peculiarities and varieties of character that they are most remarkable.

The Railway Company who should consign all their Locomotives to one uniform standard of treatment, without any allowance for varying shades of character and opinion, would soon fall as much behind-hand in the world as those greater Governments are, and ever will be, who pursue the same course with the finer piece of work called Man.

THE OLDEST INHABITANT OF THE PLACE DE GRÈVE.

The Police Courts of London have often displayed many a curious character, many a strange scene, many an exquisite bit of dialogue; so have the Police Courts in Ireland, especially at the Petty Sessions in Kilrush; but we are not so well aware of how often a scene of rich and peculiar humour occurs in the Police _tribuneaux_ of Paris. We will proceed to give the reader a “taste of their quality.”

An extremely old woman, all in rags, was continually found begging in the streets, and the Police having goodnaturedly let her off several times, were at last obliged to take her in charge, and bring her into the Court. Several magistrates were sitting. The following dialogue took place between the President and the old woman.

_President._ Now, my good woman, what have you to say for yourself? You have been frequently warned by the Police, but you have persisted in troubling people with begging.

_Old Woman_ (_in a humble quavering tone_). Ah, Monsieur le President, it is not so much trouble to other people as it is to me. I am a very old woman.

_Pres._ Come, come, you must leave off begging, or I shall be obliged to punish you.

_Old W._ But, Monsieur le President, I cannot live without--I must beg--pardon me, Monsieur--I am obliged to beg.

_Pres._ But I say you must not. Can you do no work?

_Old W._ Ah, no, Monsieur; I am too old.

_Pres._ Can’t you sell something--little cakes--bonbons?--

_Old W._ No, Monsieur, I can’t get any little stock to begin with; and, if I could, I should be robbed by the _gamins_, or the little girls, for I’m not very quick, and can’t see well.

_Pres._ Your relations must support you, then. You cannot be allowed to beg. Have you no son--no daughter--no grandchildren?

_Old W._ No, Monsieur; none--none--all my relations are dead.

_Pres._ Well then, your friends must give you assistance.

_Old W._ Ah, Monsieur, I have no friends; and, indeed, I never had but one, in my life; but he too is gone.

_Pres._ And who was he?

_Old W._ Monsieur de Robespierre--_le pauvre cher homme!_ (The poor, dear man!)

_Pres._ Robespierre!--why what did you know of him?

_Old W._ Oh, Monsieur, my mother was one of the _tricoteurs_ (knitting-women) who used to sit round the foot of the guillotine, and I always stood beside her. When Monsieur de Robespierre was passing by, in attending his duties, he used to touch my cheek, and call me (here the old woman shed tears) _la belle Marguerite_:--_le pauvre, cher homme!_

We must here pause to remind the reader that these women, the _tricoteurs_, who used to sit round the foot of the guillotine on the mornings when it was at its hideous work, were sometimes called the “Furies;” but only as a grim jest. It is well known, that, although there were occasionally some sanguinary hags amongst them, yet, for the most part, they were merely idle, gossiping women, who came there dressed in neat white caps, and with their knitting materials, out of sheer love of excitement, and to enjoy the _spectacle_.

_Pres._ Well, Goody; finish your history.

_Old W._ I was married soon after this, and then I used to take my seat as a _tricoteur_ among the others; and on the days when Monsieur de Robespierre passed, he used always to notice me--_le pauvre cher homme_. I used then to be called _la belle tricoteuse_, but now--now, I am called _la vielle radoteuse_ (the old dotardess). Ah, Monsieur le President, it is what we must all come to!

The old woman accompanied this reflection with an inimitable look at the President, which completely involved him in the _we_, thus presenting him with the prospect of becoming an old dotardess; not in the least meant offensively, but said in the innocence of her aged heart.

_Pres._ Ahem!--silence! You seem to have a very tender recollection of Monsieur Robespierre. I suppose you had reason to be grateful to him?

_Old W._ No, Monsieur, no reason in particular; for he guillotined my husband.

_Pres._ Certainly this ought to be no reason for loving his memory.

_Old W._ Ah, Monsieur, but it happened quite by accident. Monsieur de Robespierre did not intend to guillotine my husband--he had him executed by mistake for somebody else--_le pauvre cher homme!_

Thus leaving it an exquisite matter of doubt, as to whether the “poor dear man” referred to her husband, or to Monsieur de Robespierre; or whether the tender epithet was equally divided between them.

TWO CHAPTERS ON BANK NOTE FORGERIES.

CHAPTER II.

In the history of crime, as in all other histories, there is one great epoch by which minor dates are arranged and defined. In a list of remarkable events, one remarkable event more remarkable than the last, is the standard around which all smaller circumstances are grouped. Whatever happens in Mohammedan annals, is set down as having occurred so many years after the flight of the Prophet; in the records of London commerce a great fraud or a great failure is mentioned as having come to light so many months after the flight of Rowland Stephenson. Sporting men date from remarkable struggles for the Derby prize; and refer to 1840 as “Bloomsbury’s year.” The highwayman of old dated from Dick Turpin’s last appearance on the fatal stage at Tyburn turnpike. In like manner, the standard epoch in the annals of Bank Note Forgery, is the year 1797, when (on the 25th of February) one pound notes were put into circulation instead of golden guineas; or, to use the City idiom, “cash payments were suspended.”

At that time the Bank of England note was no better in appearance--had not improved as a work of art--since the days of Vaughan, Mathieson, and Old Patch; it was just as easily imitated, and the chances of the successful circulation of counterfeits were increased a thousand-fold.

Up to 1793 no notes had been issued even for sums so small as five pounds. Consequently all the Bank paper then in use, passed through the hands and under the eyes of the affluent and educated, who could more readily distinguish the false from the true. Hence, during the fourteen years which preceded the non-golden and small-note era, there were only three capital convictions for the crime. When, however, the Bank of England notes became “common and popular,” a prodigious quantity--to complete the quotation--was also made “base,” and many persons were hanged for concocting them.

To a vast number of the humbler orders, Bank Notes were a rarity and a “sight.” Many had never seen such a thing before they were called upon to take one or two pound notes in exchange for small merchandise, or their own labour. How were they to judge? How were they to tell a good from a spurious note?--especially when it happened that the officers of the Bank themselves, were occasionally mistaken, so complete and perfect were the imitations then afloat. There cannot be much doubt that where one graphic rascal was found out, ten escaped. They snapped their fingers at the executioner, and went on enjoying their beefsteaks and porter; their winter treats to the play; their summer excursions to the suburban tea-gardens; their fashionable lounges at Tunbridge Wells, Bath, Margate, and Ramsgate; doing business with wonderful unconcern and “face” all along their journeys. These usually expensive, but to them profitable enjoyments, were continually coming to light at the trials of the lesser rogues who undertook the issue department; for, from the ease with which close imitation was effected, the manufacture was more readily completed than the uttering. The fraternity and sisterhood of utterers played many parts, and were banded in strict compact with the forgers. Some were turned loose into fairs and markets, in all sorts of appropriate disguises. Farmers, who could hardly distinguish a field of standing wheat from a field of barley: Butchers who never wielded more deadly weapons than two-prong forks: Country boys with Cockney accents, bought gingerbread, and treated their so-called sweethearts with ribbons and muslins, all by the interchange of false “flimseys.” The better mannered disguised themselves as ladies and gentlemen, paid their losings at cards or hazard, or their tavern bills, their milliners, and coachmakers, in motley money composed of part real and part base bank paper. Some went about in the cloak of the Samaritan, and generously subscribed to charities wherever they saw a chance of changing a bad “five” for three or four good “ones.” Ladies of sweet disposition went about doing good among the poor; personally inquired into distress, relieved it by sending out a daughter or a son to a neighbouring shop for change; and left five shillings for present necessities, walking off with fifteen. So openly--in spite of the gallows--was forgery carried on, that whoever chose to turn utterer found no difficulty in getting a stock-in-trade to commence with. Indeed, in the days of highwaymen, no travelling gentleman’s pocket or valise was considered properly furnished without a few forged notes wherewith to satisfy the demands of the members of the “High Toby.” This offence against the laws of the road, however, soon became too common, and wayfarers who were stopped and rifled had to pledge their sacred words of honour that their notes were the genuine promises of Abraham Newland; and that their watches were not of the factory of Mr. Pinchbeck.

With temptations so strong, it is no wonder that the forgers’ trade flourished, with only an occasional check from the strong arm of the law. It followed, therefore, that from the issue of small notes in February 1797, to the end of 1817--twenty years--there were no fewer than eight hundred and seventy prosecutions connected with Bank Note Forgery, in which there were only one hundred and sixty acquittals, and upwards of three hundred executions! 1818 was the culminating point of the crime. In the first three months there were no fewer than one hundred and twenty-eight prosecutions by the Bank; and by the end of that year, two-and-thirty individuals had been hanged for Note Forgery. So far from this appalling series of examples having any effect in checking the progress of the crime, it is proved that at, and after that very time, base notes were poured into the Bank at the rate of _a hundred a day_!

The enormous number of undetected forgeries afloat, may be estimated by the fact, that from the 1st of January 1812, to the 10th April 1818, one hundred and thirty-one thousand three hundred and thirty-one pieces of paper were ornamented by the Bank officers with the word “Forged”--upwards of one hundred and seven thousand of them were one-pound counterfeits.

Intrinsically, it would appear from an Hibernian view of the case, then, that bad notes were nearly as good, (except not merely having been manufactured at the Bank), as good ones. So thoroughly and completely did some of them resemble the authorised engraving of the Bank, that it was next to impossible to distinguish the false from the true. Countless instances, showing rather the skill of the forger than the want of vigilance in Bank officials, could be brought forward. Respectable persons were constantly taken into custody on a charge of uttering forgeries, imprisoned for days and then liberated. A close scrutiny, proving that the accusations were made upon genuine paper. In September, 1818, Mr. A. Burnett, of Portsmouth, had the satisfaction of having a note which had passed through his hands returned to him from the Bank of England with the base mark upon it. Satisfied of its genuineness, he re-inclosed it to the cashier, and demanded its payment. By return of post he received the following letter:

“_Bank of England, 16 Sept., 1818._

“Sir,--I have to acknowledge your letter to Mr. Hase, of the 13th inst. inclosing a one pound note, and, in answer thereto, I beg leave to acquaint you, that, on inspection it appears to be a genuine Note of the Bank of England; I therefore, agreeably to your request, inclose you one of the like value, No. 26,276, dated 22nd August, 1818.

“I am exceedingly sorry, Sir, that such an unusual oversight should have occurred to give you so much trouble, which I trust your candour will induce you to excuse when I assure you that the unfortunate mistake has arisen entirely out of the hurry and multiplicity of business.

“I am, Sir, Your most obedient servant, A. BURNETT, ESQ. J. RIPPON. 7 Belle Vue Terrace. Southsea, near Portsmouth.”

A more extraordinary case is on record. A note was traced to the possession of a tradesman, which had been pronounced by the Bank Inspectors to have been forged. The man would not give it up and was taken before a magistrate, charged with “having a note in his possession, well knowing it to be forged.” He was committed to prison on evidence of the Bank Inspector; but was afterwards released on bail to appear when called on. He was _not_ called on; and, at the expiration of twelvemonths (having kept the note all that time), he brought an action against the Bank for false imprisonment. On the trial the note was proved to be genuine! and the plaintiff was awarded damages of one hundred pounds.

It is a fact sufficiently dreadful that three hundred and thirty human lives should have been sacrificed in twenty-one years; but when we relate a circumstance which admits the merest probability that some--even one--of those lives may have been sacrificed in innocence of the offence for which they suffered, the consideration becomes appalling.

Some time after the frequency of the crime had, in other respects subsided, there was a sort of bloody assize at Haverfordwest, in Wales; several prisoners were tried for forging and uttering, and thirteen were convicted; chiefly on the evidence of Mr. Christmas, a Bank Inspector, who swore positively, in one case, that the document named in the indictment “was not an impression from a Bank of England plate; was not printed on the paper with the ink or water-mark of the Bank; neither was it in the handwriting of the signing clerk.” Upon this testimony the prisoner, together with twelve participators in similar crimes, were condemned to be hanged!

The morning after the trial, Mr. Christmas was leaving his lodging, when an acquaintance stepped up and asked him, as a friend, to give his opinion on a note he had that morning received. It was a bright day; Mr. Christmas put on his spectacles, and carefully scrutinised the document in a business-like and leisurely manner. He pronounced it to be forged. The gentleman, a little chagrined, brought it away with him to town. It is not a little singular that he happened to know Mr. Burnett, of Portsmouth, whom he accidentally met, and to whom he showed the note. Mr. Burnett was evidently a capital judge of Bank paper. He said nothing, but slipping his hand into one pocket, handed to the astonished gentleman full change, and put the note into another. “It cannot be a good note,” exclaimed the latter, “for my friend Christmas told me at Haverfordwest that it is a forgery!” But as Mr. Burnett had backed his opinion to the amount of twenty shillings he declined to retract it; and lost no time in writing to Mr. Henry Hase (Abraham Newland’s successor) to test its accuracy.

It was lucky that he did so; for this little circumstance saved thirteen lives!

Mr. Christmas’s co-inspectors at the Bank of England actually reversed his non-official judgment that the note was a forgery. It was officially pronounced to be a good note; yet upon the evidence of Mr. Christmas as regards other notes, the thirteen human beings at Haverfordwest were trembling at the foot of the gallows. It was promptly and cogently argued that as Mr. Christmas’s judgment had failed him in the deliberate examination of one note, it might also err as to others, and the convicts were respited.