OUR LONDON LETTER.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1726, 1 September 1879, Page 2

OUR LONDON LETTER.

[WEITTEN SPECIALLY FOE THE GLOBE.J LONDON, July 17. The “ season” is drawing to a close, and yet we have not had one day of summer! Even people with good memories cannot recollect when we have had such a long period of gloom and wet as has befallen us this year and in many departments trade, which baa been bad for long enough, has grown worse than ever. Storm after storm has rolled over us from the Atlantic, flooding us with rain, until truly in those weeks of the year which are usually termed “ the dog days” there has been such constant bad weather that you would not turn a dog out. There is very little fruit, and what comes to market is hardly worth buying. The prospect for the farmers is still more serious and depressed than they had previously been by a long run of low prices of wheat and meat; many of them are now giving up their holdings, being unable to stand out any longer against a constantly increasing loss. Some, I hear, having saved enough out of the wreck of their fortunes to emigrate are about to take themselves and their families to New Zealand, while a still larger body of them are going to Canada. And as if to add to the general dulness of things, the death of the Prince Imperial, the arrival of his remains at hig mother’s abode at Chislehurst, and the funeral ceremonies, put a complete stop during several weeks to all sorts of amusements among the higher circles of London society, and it was not until yesterday, when there was a garden party at Holland House, followed iu the evening by a State concert at Buckingham Palace, that there was any symptom of that gaiety which is usually so general at this season. The departure of people from London to the various watering places, which ought now to be commencing, is indefinitely postponed, and will, from all I hear, be given up in many cases, unless there should be a speedy change. We read in the papere that a wave of hot weather is just now paesing over the United States, but in England we are still wearing clothing that is rather fitted for January than July, and the trade in umbrellas seems to be the only one that is brisk.

lobserve thatyour Agent-General has at length extended his patronage to the Royal Colonial Institute, a body which, under the presidency of the Duke of Manchester, has for many years been doing a very useful work in London, and which I am only surprised that Sir Julius Vogel has not thought it proper to join before. At the last meeting several other gentlemen connected with New Zealand, including Dr. Irving, Mr Alfred Domett, Mr O. G. Hawdon, and Mr W. W. Wilson, were elected members. One can scarcely name & subject of colonial importance that this institute has not taken up, and its monthly meetings not only afford a pleasant reunion for .'colonists who may happen to be either permanently or temporarily in London, but the evening is always devoted to the discussion of a subject of general interest, and I may add that the papers read are usually very well written, and much above what one ordinarily meets with at meetings of similar societies. The present month has been remarkable for the number and importance of the speculations connected with New Zealand, and particularly with your province, which have been floated in London, and for the most part with remarkable success. Of course this event has not failed to call forth the solemn warnings that are periodically uttered about the rapid increase of the public debt in your country, but the best answer thereto is afforded by the way in which all appeals for loans are answered by the investing public, who have long ago learned to be very wary, and not too ready to swallow the bait of a high per centage where there was any apparent risk of loss. The plain truth is that New Zealand, and especially the southern part of it, is in good reputation at home, and we can well spare for your public improvements a share of our large quantity of unemployed capital. For the fact is that we have an enormous accumulation of money in this country for which there is no very profitable outlet, and I am daily more and more surprised at the price which is realised by every species of investment that is safe and easily realisable. But on what slender foundations a good deal of our trading is carried on, and bow easily, inconsequence of the failure of the City of Glasgow and other banks, the public will take the most groundless alarm about the safety of their money is particularly shown in an action which the Capital and Counties Bank, a concern which has a large number of branches in Hampshire and Sussex, has brought against Messrs Henty and Co., who have a large number of branches in the shape of the 137 public-houses which they own in various parts of those two counties. Their headquarters are at Chichester, and when to that city there came a new manager for the Bank there was speedily a dispute in consequence, principally, of the “ bumptiousness” of the banking official, who would not cash cheques on other branches, except on conditions that had never before been insisted upon. Thereupon Messrs Henty issued a circular to all their tenants giving notice that they would not accept cheques drawn on any of the branches of the bank. The consequence, according to the bank manager, was a “run” upon them, which amounted to more than a quarter of a million within a fortnight, while the floating balances bad since permanently decreased. To meet this extraordinary demand for money they were obliged to make a forced sale of their investments, which they did at a great loss. They now alleged Messrs Henty'g circular to be a libel, and brought an action to recover two thousand pounds damages. The questions left to the jury were found to be so difficult that they could not agree upon a verdict and were discharged. There has been a renewed demand this summer for the liberation of " the Claimant,” as be used to be called, with whom I thought the hon. member for Stoke-upon-Trent had ceased to have anything to do, but I find I was mistaken, for in the House of Commons a few days ago, Dr. Kenealy asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if ho would state to the House why ho objected to see Captain Barry, of New Zealand, who was a person of position there, having been three times Mayor, and who, having well known Arthur Orton and de Castro, was prepared to prove that they were two distinct individuals. Mr Cross replied that, having received a written statement from the gentleman referred to, he took the usual course on such occasions, namely, of sending the document in question to the Solicitor of the Treasury, I may add that a long circular on this subject has been printed and circulated, but the London newspapers have ceased to show any interest in this subject. I dare say all of my readers have heard of Finsbury squares possibly some of them know it. The latter will probably recollect that at one corner of the road that runs through it stands the emporium of Messrs F. Cotter and Co., who minister to the outward adornment of the female sex, and do it in first-class style. Amongst the large number of assistants employed in their establishment was not long ago a young widow named Hall, whose talent in getting up stylish goods commanded a large salary, notwithstanding which she seems to have thought that a second husband would be preferable. One afternoon, business being over, she strolled down Finsbury pavement and Moergato street to the Bank where she entered an omnibus bound for the West End. In the same vehicle rode Mr Schelizzi, a Greek merchant, one of a firm carrying on business in the city. He seems to have become enamored of her at first sight, and so when she alighted in Oxford street, intending to study the fashions as displayed there in the shop windows, he also descended from the omnibus, and soon found an occasion to speak to her. He showed her the small silver coin which she had given in payment of her fare, and which ho had obtained in change for a larger one, and this foolish Greet kissed it and said something very silly about it. They walked along Regent street for some time, and he took her into a shop and bought for her one of those massive silver chains and lockets for which the ladies some time ago had a temporary madness.

Well, the acquaintance thus begun continued for some time, until at length when Mr Sohelzzi had to go aboard he refused to have anything more to say to Mrs Hall, who thereiqpon brought an action for of promise of marriage against him. He coolly pleaded that the idea of marriage never entertained on his part, nor on her s. it seems that he kept up a very considerable establishment for a and that he called his dwelling-house ‘‘Hypatia Villa, after, as he explained to Mrs Hall when he was sitting with her in a place of amusement, a Grecian goddess who was famous tor all those virtues which he himself had not inherited, for his villa was the scene of some very improper proceedings indeed on the part of both himself and Mrs Hall, and about which the latter had not said a word either to her solicitor or to the jury. They found a verdict in favor of the defendant, whose evidence was the most shameless and disgusting avowal ever made in the witness box. In fact, he seems to be in the habit of prowling about the streets of London in search of adventures, although profligacy has reduced him to nearly a wreck. London has just witnessed the horrifying and unprecedented spectacle of two of her Majesty’s Judges sitting at the same time in two of the Courts at the Old Bailey to try two young women who were prosecuted by the principal law officers of the Crown on charges of murdering older women, both crimes having been committed under circumstances of extraordinary brutality. One case was S roved, but in the other, though there was no oubt about a murder having been committed, there was no evedence to bring it home to the accused, who had indeed voluntarily made to the police a statement which rather seemed in favor of her innocence. The prisoner in this case was Hannah Dobbs, who had been in the service of Mr and Mrs Bastendorff, who keep in Euston Square a house which they let out in apartments. Amongst the lodger* whom they have had at different times was an eccentric old maid named Miss Hacker, who had not been seen for about eighteen months, and about whom no inquiry seems to have been made until a few weeks ago, when, on one of the coal cellars of the house being cleaned out, her body was found huddled up in one corner, in such a state of dirt and decomposition that it was not recognisable, and could only be identified by some of the dress ornaments found near it. Around the neck was a rope. Dobbs was found in possession of some things that are supposed to have belonged to the old lady, and she did not give a very satisfactory account of them ; hut as, when the body was discovered, she was in custody for robbing another employer, this was felt not to be enough to convict her of murder. In the other case guilt was plain. Kate Webster was in the service of a Mrs Thomas, a widow, who possessed a small competency, and lived in a cottage at Richmond. The crime in this cose seems to have been committed solely for the sake of gain, for having disposed of the body, Webster took possession of the household goods, represented herself to be the owner of them, and tried to sell them. She did, in feet, obtain from one man an advance which enabled to her escape from the country, and when she was arrested in Ireland she turned round and made an accusation of murder against him, which she now admits to be false. When the untruth of thia was first made evident she made a 11 confession," in which she implicated another man, whom she now declares to be equally innocent, and when sentence of death was pronounced upon her she told the Judge that the real man who instigated the murder was not yet known to the police; but the Judge evidently disbelieved this story, and regarded her as the sole murderess. Her tale has since been shown to be no more trustworthy than its prececessors.

You might think it very strange for a trial on a charge of attempted murder to end in a wedding, instead of penal servitude, yet such an erent happened last week at Worcester, where a young fellow named William Ballard was indicted for trying to out the throat of a girl named Susan Little, whom he had courted and promised to marry. Their attachment, however, resulted in the birth of » baby before wedlock, notwithstanding which Ballard seems to have been very fond of both mother and child, and made every provision for them according to hie circumstances. Preparations were being made for their wedding, when the girl took a situation as wet nurse in the family of a clergyman near Worcester. The girl’s new master behaved in a very cruel way, and his ill-advised conduct 'brought down upon him a very severe reprimand from Mr Justice Hawkins, who tried the case. When the wedding day arrived the reverend gentleman refused to allow the girl to leave his house, on pain of immediate discharge from his service, although she offered to return immediately after the ceremony was concluded. An indefinite postponement was the enforced result, and not many days afterwards the clergyman followed up this arbitrary conduct by compelling the girl to take out an affiliation summons against the father of her child. This seems to have greatly enraged Ballard, who was rather proud of his child. When she was going towards the Court, to give evidence on the summons, Ballard, who had token to drinking heavily, met her, and, after trying to cut her throat, attempted to commit suicide. Fortunately he did not succeed in either. So he came up last week for trial, and of course was found guilty, whereupon Mr Justice Hawkins called up the girl, and ascertained from her that she was quite willing to marry the prisoner. Accordingly Ballard was cautioned as to his future conduct and set at liberty on his own recognizance, to come up for judgment whenever he should be called upon to do so. Next morning these young people were married, and I hear that the High Sheriff of the county paid for the marriage license, while the kindlv Judge defrayed the cost of the wedding ring.

Qui custodiet ipios evstodes was a question which was asked a good while ago, hut it has an application at the present day, for even those who are employed at the head-quarters of our police need some one to look after them as was instanced by those detectives who were mixed up with the great turf fraud case not long ago. Now a young constable who was employed in the office of the Re-ceiver-General of Metropolitan Police has been found out in forgery and robbery, though it looks as if he would not have been suspected had he not thought it proper to absent himself from his post, as he certainly would not have then been arrested, but that he preferred to give himself up rather than live in the constant dread of being taken into custody. His crime was a simple but daring one. Being employed daily to take the books to and fro between the chief offices of the police and the Western Branch of the Bank of England, for the police are obliged to deal with that establishment though they have two or three first-rate Banks much nearer to them, he seized the opportunity to abstract a couple of cheques, one of which he filled up for tour hundred pounds and forged the name of one of the police commissioners, and as he was well known to the Bank he had no difficulty in getting his cheque changed for gold. Indeed we have quite a plentiful crop of forgeries just now, and in another case the Bank of England has only escaped being victimised to a large amount through the extraordinary Srecautions taken by one of their enstomers, [essrs John Arthur and Co., the foremost English bankers in Paris. A young man who is believed to be an American, went to a quiet branch Bank at Croydon, and opened an account. A day or two afterwards he paid in a cheque, which purported to be drawn by Messrs Arthur for the sum of £905. Fortunately, Messrs Arthur have a custom of sending to the Bank of England a private advice note of the amount of the various cheques they draw, and owing to this the forgery was discovered, although it was not until after telegrams had passed between London and Paris that the bank clerks really believed it was forgery and not an error.