Part 35

The trial of the girl was concluded, and I had no doubt as to her fate, now that I became acquainted with the principle,--she was acquitted, and never shall I forget the effect which this result of her trial produced upon her manners and features. The moment my friend Zig-zag had pronounced the words, "Not guilty," the pathetic expression which had characterised her countenance turned into the most humorous, and having winked her eye at the learned judge, who, poor man, had summed up decidedly against her, she proceeded to place her two hands extended in a right line from the tip of her nose, in the direction of his lordship's seat, after the fashion of what is called "taking a double sight," and then, making a noise which, if not indescribable by imitation, is certainly irreducible to writing, something between that which a hackney-coachman utters to encourage his tired horses, and that which a duck makes when it sees either a ditch or a drake in dry weather, she turned herself suddenly round with the least graceful pirouette I ever saw, leaving one of the hands which she had previously elevated for observation the last part of her person visible.

A short case of pot-stealing followed--the prisoner was found guilty in ten minutes; and then came _the_ case. It was a curious and intricate one, and I felt quite assured, when I saw the prisoner, a genteel-looking young man, take his place under the inverted mirror, contrived with an almost diabolical ingenuity, so as to refract and reflect the light upon his face from the huge window at his back; I said to myself, having got both hardened and hungry during my short probation in court, "We shall not dine at six to-day."

It might, perhaps, injure the feelings of the individual himself, or, if he is dead, those of his friends and relations, to detail the particular case, the more especially as nothing could be clearer than that the crime laid to his charge was amply and satisfactorily--to everybody except himself--proved and substantiated.

Just as the last witness for the defence was under cross-examination, I saw one of the lord mayor's servants put his powdered head in a little hole, and whisper something to the ordinary of Newgate, a remarkably pious-looking man, in full canonicals, with a bag-wig, which, to use Foote's phraseology, speaking of Dr. Simony (by whom, as of course everybody knows, he meant the unfortunate Dr. Dodd), "looked as white as a curd, and as close as a cauliflower." It struck me that either the pretty wanton who had just been acquitted desired some serious conversation with the clergyman, or that the last convicted pot-stealer felt some qualms of conscience, and had sent for spiritual assistance; but no,--my friend Mr. Sheriff Bucklesbury relieved my mind from any such apprehensions, by inviting me to a whisper, with an expression of countenance which convinced me that it was nothing of so serious a character which had suddenly summoned the reverend divine from the court.

"Good news!" said the sheriff; "land is in sight."

"What?" said I, not exactly catching the idea.

"Dinner is not far distant," said the sheriff, "the ordinary has been sent for to dress the salad."

Well, thought I, that ever a man so dressed, and so addressed, as the reverend divine opposite, should quit the seat of justice tempered with mercy, to mix oil and vinegar in a salad-bowl, does seem strange. It was evident to _me_, from the manner in which my friend spoke of the chaplain's secular vocations, that his respect for the table was infinitely greater than that which he entertained for the cloth, and never from that day have I seen painted over suburban inns, "an ordinary on Sundays at two o'clock," without thinking of the reverend functionary so styled in the Old Bailey, and the probable duties he would be called upon to perform.

The evidence having terminated, and the clock pointing to fifteen minutes after six, his lordship began summing up. I have already mentioned that his lordship was deaf, and the strange blunders which I noticed in his early charges will perhaps serve to inform the reader of these papers, whoever he may be, that his lordship's handwriting was utterly unintelligible, even to himself; indeed, so completely illegible were his notes, that the only resource his lordship had, if ever they were called for upon motions for new trials (which perhaps I need not here add, was in his lordship's case by no means an unfrequent occurrence), was to send them to be printed--printers being proverbially the best decypherers in the world.

His lordship's charge--barring the inevitable blunders and hesitations, rendered absolutely necessary by this almost hopeless illegibility--was exceedingly minute and elaborated. He recapitulated the evidence of the three first witnesses verbatim, and continued thus of the fourth:--

"Now, gentlemen of the jury, here is Amos Hardy--Handy--no, not Handy--Harding--Amos Harding tells you, that on Tuesday--no, not Tuesday--I see--Friday the 14th--that is, the 24th--he was going along Liverpool--no--Liquorpond Street--near Gug's Island--Guy's--no--Gray's Inn Lane--yes--going along Liquorpond Street, Gray's Inn Lane--at about eight o'clock in the morning--and saw the fire break out of Mr. Stephenson's windows. This, gentlemen of the jury, is a very remarkable fact--and in connection with some other circumstances to which we shall presently come, is quite worthy of your particular attention--you perceive that he swears to eight o'clock in the morning."

"Evening, my lord," said Mr. Flappertrap, standing up and whispering his lordship audibly.

"Evening is it?" said his lordship--"ay, so it is--evening--no matter--he swears to the time at which he saw the fire break out--and hence will naturally arise in your minds a chain of circumstances which it will be my duty to endeavour to unravel. In the first place----"

Hereabouts one of the servants of the court put his head in at one of the doors at the back of the bench, and whispered the lord mayor much after the same manner in which Mr. Flappertrap had just before whispered the judge. His lordship immediately pulled out his watch--then looked at the clock--and then wrote a few words upon a slip of paper, and laid that slip of paper upon his lordship's notes. The judge took up the memorandum, and tore it in pieces--as I thought indignantly.

"You know what that means?" said my friend, the sheriff.

"No," said I.

"Dinner's waiting," replied my friend--an announcement which startled me, as it seemed impossible but that it would be kept waiting for some time. This little scene, however, was followed by the arrival of the recorder, who, after bowing to the lord mayor, took his seat on the bench.

"I told you so," said the sheriff; "Mr. Recorder is come to try the remaining cases----" A cry of "Silence--pray, silence," indicated that Mr. Sheriff Bucklesbury and I were speaking somewhat too loudly.

"The circumstances to which I allude," continued his lordship, after he had torn up the note, "are in fact so clearly detailed in the evidence you have heard, that to men of intelligence and experience, like those I am now addressing, any attempt at explanation on my part would be superfluous. The case appears a very clear one--you have to decide upon the value of the evidence, and return your verdict accordingly, giving the prisoner the benefit of any doubts you may entertain on the question."

Never was I more surprised than at finding the promised explanations and comparisons of fact and testimony so suddenly cut short, after the manner of "the story of the Bear and Fiddle," and I could not help, while the clerk of the arraigns was putting his accustomed question to the jury, noticing the circumstance to my worshipful friend.

"To be sure," said the sheriff, "don't you see--the time is up--he smells the marrow puddings."

The jury, emulating the expedition of the judge, in one minute, according to the zig-zag system, acquitted the prisoner; whereupon, his lordship rising to depart, addressed that individual in words to this effect:--

"Prisoner at the bar, you have been tried by an able, patient, and conscientious jury of your countrymen, who, convinced like myself of the enormity of your crime, and of the wicked intentions by which you were actuated in its commission, have returned the only verdict which they could justly and honestly return--they have well discharged their duty. And although it is not my province in this place to pronounce the awful sentence of the law upon you, I shall take care----"

Here Mr. Flappertrap whispered his lordship that the jury had acquitted the prisoner.

"By-and-by, sir," said his lordship, angry at being interrupted--"I shall take care, young man, that an example shall be made in your person of the----"

The lord mayor here ventured to suggest that the "young man" was found not guilty.

"Very well, my lord--presently, presently," said his lordship--"even-handedness of justice; and that an enormous offender of your class may not be suffered to escape the just vengeance of the laws which he has outraged."

Here Mr. Flappertrap whipped a bit of paper over the desk of the bench into the very place which the announcement of dinner had so recently occupied. His lordship looked at it, and exclaimed, unconsciously--"Oh! ah!--umph!" and then continued--"It is true that upon the present occasion the mercy and forbearance of the jury have been exercised in a signal manner; and I trust their benevolence and indulgence will not be thrown away upon you. I maintain my own opinion still--yet they have decided, and I have only to receive that decision--you are discharged, sir, and may go about your business; but I can tell you this, young man, you have had a very narrow escape indeed."

There was not a man in court who did not tacitly admit the truth and justice of at least the concluding passage of his lordship's address to the acquitted prisoner; nor was that individual himself the least astonished of his lordship's auditors. The incident, however, was worthy of its place in the day's proceedings, as producing a climax to the judicial operations of the learned lord, and leaving upon the minds of all his majesty's liege subjects then and there present, a conviction, that however classical it maybe to picture Justice blind, it is not, as a matter of convenience and utility, at all desirable that she should also be deaf.

THE TOOTHPICK-MAKERS' COMPANY.

The day was extremely fine; the windows of the rooms opening to the water, the house smelling of fried fish and mud, and the little boys with naked legs screaming, "please to make a scramble," we having attained this enviable position in the building which looked like a race-stand, by treading a labyrinth of the dirtiest alleys and stable-yards that ever pauper or pony inhabited. It was, however, a joyous scene; and Hull, who was good enough to be my Mentor on the occasion, pooh-poohed the waiters into allowing us to look at the dinner-room, all laid out for the company; more than a hundred were expected, partitions had been pulled down, holes cut out here, and props poked in there, to afford the required accommodation; in short, everything gave token of a goodly day.

Hull, who was at home everywhere, and everywhere popular, appeared, as soon as he arrived, to supersede everybody else.

"My dear friend," said he, "I happen to know these people--the Toothpick Makers are one of the most ancient corporations of the city. My dear sir, the Mercers were incorporated in the 17th of Richard the Second--I have a tract that will prove it--1393 they were embodied--I know the clerk of the company at this day--so do you."

"No, I do not," said I.

"Pooh, pooh," said Hull, "don't tell _me_--Jemmy Hobbs--everybody knows Jemmy Hobbs--married Miss Ball of Blackheath--'Splendid fellow, Jemmy. Well! these Mercers are a fine company, so are the Grocers,--St. Anthony is their patron. My dear sir, I am forced to know all these things. Then there are the Drapers, and the Fishmongers--pooh, pooh--Doctors, and Proctors, and Princes of the Blood, are all fishmongers--Walworth was a fishmonger--eh--my dear friend, you should see their paintings--splendid things--Spiridiona Roma--fish in all seasons. Then there are the Goldsmiths and the Skinners, and the Merchant Tailors--Linen Armourers--eh--queer fellows, some of them; but I do assure you--" (this was said in a whisper,) "you will see some men here to-day worth seeing."

"I suppose," said I, "the Toothpick Makers' Company was founded by Curius Dentatus--whence comes the French _cure-dent_."

"Pooh, pooh," said Hull, "no such thing--much older than Curius Dentatus--I happen to know--founded in the reign of Edward the Fifth, my dear friend."

About this period the company began to arrive "thicker and faster," and certainly I had never seen any one of them before, which gave, at least, an air of novelty to the scene. Generally speaking, they ran fat, and wore white waistcoats, such as that to which I had likened the bow window of 77, St. James's Street: they looked all very hot, and puffed a good deal;--however, they kept coming and coming, until the drawing-room, as a sort of thing like a bad conservatory, well placed to the south-west, was called, was so full that I began to be as hot as my companions. Six o'clock arrived, but no dinner; the master of the house (who, from wearing a similar sort of uniform waistcoat, I took to be a Toothpick Maker,) came in and spoke to some of the fattest persons of the community, evidently intimating that the banquet was ready--nevertheless no move was made, because it appeared that Mr. Hicks had not arrived.

"You had better," said one of the more important persons in the room, "let men be placed ready to see when Mr. Hicks arrives at the end of the lane by the stables."

"Yes, sir," was the answer; and from that time I heard nothing but Hicks and Mr. Hicks talked of, until I was driven by extreme curiosity to inquire of my omniscient friend Hull, who Mr. Hicks was.

"Hicks!" exclaimed Hull--"why, my dear friend, you know Mr. Hicks--the great Mr. Hicks--everybody knows Hicks."

"I for one," said I, "do not--" and it turned out that at the moment I was not likely to be enlightened, for, just as Hull was about to give me an account of this important personage, a hubbub and bustle near the door, which speedily pervaded the whole assembly, proclaimed his arrival. In a moment the buzz of conversation ceased, a sort of circle was made round Mr. Hicks, and several of the most distinguished members of the community hurried up to take their places near him. Hull dragged me towards this sanctum, this magic ring, and, with a look of the greatest importance, assured me, that it was right that I should immediately be presented to Mr. Hicks. The presentation accordingly took place, and no sooner was it over, than one of the grandees came up to me, and, in a confidential whisper, informed me that my place at dinner was on the left of Mr. Hicks, as being a friend of the master. I concluded that the arrangement was attributable to Hull, who, I found, was to be my neighbour on the left, and, although I could have dispensed with the honour of so close an approximation to the hero of the day, I rejoiced mightily that I was placed so near my friend Hull, who would be as useful to me upon such an occasion as is a catalogue of the pictures at an exhibition anywhere else.

In a very short time dinner was announced, and Mr. Hicks, having the master on his right hand, led the way to the large room upstairs, round the whole of which the table ran, exhibiting, as I entered the apartment, a lengthened line of tin covers, looking like a collection of cuirasses, glittering on the board;--the heat was tremendous, and the air redolent with fried flounders. A few minutes sufficed to arrange us, grace was said by the chaplain, and we fell to. As in all similar cases, the exercise of eating and drinking superseded conversation or remark, and I, who did but little in that way myself, and having therefore an opportunity of seeing the _modus operandi_ at my leisure, became suddenly enlightened as to the extent to which such pleasures may be carried. Of each and every dish did each and every man partake, from turtle to white-bait, both inclusive; by comparison with the individuals now before and around me, my friend Bucklesbury, whom I had a week before considered a prodigy in the way of feeding, sank into insignificance; to the elaborated course of fish succeeded a host of fowls, cutlets, hashes, stews, and other things of that nature, accompanied by sundry haunches of venison, and succeeded again by ducks innumerable, and peas immeasurable. The destruction of all these articles was, however, effected with ease in less than an hour and a half, during which the attentions paid to Mr. Hicks were most marked and gratifying: if the sun shone in upon the tip of his nose, the waiters were ordered to pull down the blinds before him; if the gentlest breeze wantoned about the back of his neck, the master of the house was called to shut the window behind him; for _him_ the chairman culled the choicest bits; to _him_ the landlord tendered his most particular wines: every eye was fixed on _his_ actions, every ear seemed open to _his_ words; he had, however, as yet spoken little, but had "eaten the more."

All sublunary pleasures must have an end, so had this dinner; and a call of silence, and the thumping of the president's hammer upon the table, announced that some professional gentlemen were about to sing _Non nobis, Domine_. They began--we all standing up--I with the sun full in my eyes, setting over London in all its glory. The voices harmonised beautifully; but fine and melodious as they were, I felt that the canon, or whatever it is called, very much resembled a fire which, smouldering and smouldering in the low notes, kept perpetually bursting out in a fresh place, when one fancied it out. As far as the religious feeling of the thing goes, it was misplaced; and as for its duration, it seemed to be more like three graces than one.

This over, the wine began to pass, and "beards to wag;" Hicks grew condescending, and the day began to mend; the King's health was given--song, God save the King--chorus by the company, all standing--The Queen--The Prince of Wales--then the Duke of York and the Army--the Duke of Clarence and the Navy--the Memory of St. Ursula, the mother of all Toothpick Makers, with an appropriate glee, received with loud cheers.

The Master then rose and begged to propose a toast. No sooner had he uttered these words, than the whole room rang with applause, the wine-glasses danced hornpipes upon the table to the music of the forks and spoons, and the noise was tremendous. "I see," continued the worthy president, "that you anticipate my intentions; gentlemen, there could be no doubt upon your minds what the toast would be" (more cheering). "I will not occupy your time, nor hinder you from the gratification of your feelings upon this topic by dilating upon the merits of the illustrious individual whose health I am about to propose; whether we regard him in public life, guiding by his zeal and energy the community which he fosters and protects by his influence, or view him in private society, the ornament of the circle of which he is the centre, our gratitude and admiration are equally excited. Gentlemen, I will not trespass upon your time, or wound, what I know to be the delicacy of his feelings, by recapitulating the deeds which gild his name, and which have, during the last year, added so much to his honour and reputation, and to the welfare and comfort of his colleagues and associates:--I beg to propose the health of Benjamin Spooner Hicks, Esq.,--a name dear to every Englishman--with all the honours."

Then came a storm of applause unparalleled, at least in my experience. A band of music, which had hitherto been silent, struck up "See the Conquering Hero comes," and nine times nine cheers were given in a style the most overwhelming. During this storm of rapture, I seized the opportunity of once again asking Hull who Hicks was, and what he had done, to deserve and receive all these extraordinary marks of approbation and applause, but all I could extract from my rubicund friend was, "Pooh, pooh,--don't tell me--you know Hicks--my dear friend, everybody knows Hicks--there isn't a man better known in the universe." There was no time amidst the din of glory to assure him once more that I had by no possible accident ever heard his name before, so I resumed my seat, as the object of our enthusiasm quitted his, to return thanks. His up-rising was hailed by the company with an almost Persic adoration:--silence at length having been obtained, he spake--

"Sir, and Gentlemen,--There are certain periods in our existence which entirely defy description--this, as far as I am concerned, is one of them. I have been placed in many trying situations, and I think I may say, without fear of contradiction, I have behaved as became a man (loud cheers); I am aware that some of my efforts for the benefit of my fellow-creatures have been crowned with success (hear, hear, hear); and I am thankful to Providence that I am possessed of the means to do good to them as is not so well off as myself (loud cheers). I say, sir, it would be the height of baseness for a man who has been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, not now and then to take it out, and feed them as has not been so fortunate (great cheering). My political feelings and principles I need not touch upon (immense cheering); they are known to all the world (tumultuous applause); I shall steadily maintain the course I have heretofore followed, and observe the straight line, neither swerving to the right, nor to the left, as little awed by the frown of power as flattered by its smiles (hear, hear, hear).

"Gentlemen, I sincerely thank you for the honour you have done me, and beg to drink all your good healths in return."

The shoutings were here renewed, but to an extent far beyond the former exhibition. Mr. Hicks sat down, but still the thunder continued; and scarcely had it subsided, even for a moment, when Mr. Hicks, upon his legs again, caused a relapse which nearly drove me mad.

Hicks waved his hand, and it was a calm--you might have heard a pin drop--he had to propose the health of the worshipful chairman, the Master of the Toothpick Makers' Company.

After expressing in almost the same words that Hicks had just before used, his conviction that this was the "proudest moment of his life," the chairman continued to observe, that if anything could possibly add to the gratification of having his health drunk by such an assembly, it was the fact of its having been proposed by such an individual. He then proceeded to say, that he was quite sure in that society, composed as it was of men of all parties, all professions, and all politics, he need not expatiate upon the merits of the honourable gentleman to whom he had previously alluded--they were known all over the world. _He_, like Hicks, returned the most heartfelt acknowledgments for the favour he had received at their hands, and sat down amidst very loud acclamations.

Still I was left in ignorance of all the great deeds which "gilt" my friend Hicks's "humble name;" and I found, being so near him, that it was quite impossible to get enlightenment. At length, however, I was destined to hear something of the character of his achievements; for shortly after the worshipful master had sat down, and just before the healths of the wardens of the Toothpicks, or some such functionaries, were about to be toasted, a tall, thin, pale man--a rare specimen in the Museum--rose and said, as nearly as I can recollect, what follows:--