THE SEAMY SIDE.

Hokitika Guardian, 14 January 1926, Page 4

THE SEAMY SIDE.

TALES TOLD TO THE MAGISTRATE GIRL WHO DRESSED UP. (R. K. Confer in the “Daily Mail.”) “She had worked hard all her life and never had any pretty clothes,” said a detective, alluding to a young Welsh girl who wept in the dock at the Oldstreet- Police Court yesterday. When a hardened officer puts forward the philosopv of clothes as an excuse for theft one naturally takes notice. The girl, who lived with her married sister in the neighbourhood of Swansea, heard the call of the city and, answering an advertisement for a domestic servant, was engaged by the wife of a cabinet maker at a wage of 10s a week. She arrived in London last Monday with a tin trunk and a small wardrobe, and given the run of the house, was confronted for the first-time in her life with pretty dresses, silk stockings and the flimsy, filmy garments wliic-h are poetry to girls brought up on facts and flannel. She was only 20 and she had never been farther afield than Swansea, and she played at being a princess in the solitude of her room. •She dressed up before the mirror in the clothes of her mistress, and. thrilled at the thought that she was only 20, she played the part of a transformed Cinderella until she was found out, and then came the sympathetic detective and the dock at Old-street..

“ She had worked hard all her life and never had any pretty clothes!” That sentence summed up the case. Novels have been written on a more slender basis. .Air Cairns, the magistrate, was impressed. “A sudden temptation acting on an imaginative girl,” was his diagnosis. “ Perhaps the Welsh Society in London will help her to find another situation,” ho snggest-

Meanwhile, the penitent girl was sent to a hostel in charge of the woman missionary. She looked a demure little creature, showing nothing of the attributes of a thief, and her c-rime, to ray mind, was merely the desire to dress up and show off. There is nothing much wrong with an offender who c-an win the sympathy and touch the heart of an experienced detective in the East End of London.

Very different was the next case, which concerned a married woman employed as a eiagretle catcher in a tobacco factory which employs 1,400 hands. She had-heen suspected a fortnight and on being searched a quantity of loose cigarettes were found in her handbag. Married to a stoker who earned £3 6s a week the woman herself was paid £1 18s Gd. There was no family and the couple paid only 9s a week rent, leaving nearly £5 a week to keep the two. “ Workers have a duty to their employers,” said Mr Cairns severely, “hut that is a. principle not sufficiently recognised in this district. Owing to extensive pilfering at the docks I have been compelled to send offenders to prison, as lines are useless to stop these mean thefts, and I shall have to apply the rule to factory hands. On this occasion there will he n fine of £.5 —very dear cigarettes.”

“ This woman wants her fare to America,” announced the warrant officer. introducing a middle-aged matron who wore a 'Turner sunset on her head. “No ; only to Barrow-in-Furness to begin with,” protested the applicant liiodcstlv.

“ What a curious notion. Certainly not!” remarked the magistrate, who keeps a close guard over the poor-box. East End aliens arc among the first to realise that the police court is not so much a. place of punishment as an instituioii for rclieveing the material and legal troubles of the poor. More philanthropy than punishment is administeied in these East End courts, hence the large queues of applicants, daily seeking advice and assistance. But 1 1 ee railway fares are not given away for the asking.

A voluble woman, wearing sausage curls, complained that a neighbour had taken a sudden dislike to her. “ I have never spoken to tile woman in my lile,” she said resentfully, “ but she hates the sight of my face, and she dances in iront of me and says things no respectable woman can listen to and keep calm.” “She must be insane,” declared Afr Cairns, instructing an officer to investigate and report. A tall woman, adorned with a black hat trimmed with forget-me-nots, displayed three half crowns in her open palm. “ ri.u,” she said bitterly, ‘‘is what my husband expects me to keep house on for a week.” Js lie working ?” asked the magistrate. M orking!” exclaimed the woman, laughing scornfully. “He is too proud to work. He gets a pension of 35s a week, and what he receives from the dole brings it up to £3. Him work! The very thought of work would kill him. Three half-crowns.” She tooka summons and her departure.

A woman with an orange and gold hat. and a firm mouth, explained that her neighbour had summoned her for abuse, and having 2s to spare she desired a cross-summons. “ Nothing doing.” remarked Mr Cairns,

Married for two years, a young wife, alter persuading her ha by that tram tickets were not good for its digestion, said she was tired of being knocked about by her husband. “ I loft him to live with my father, then T left him to live with my sister, and now T want to leave him for good,” she said, thwarting the child in an attempt to eat the feather in her hat. She was granted a summons for persistent cruelty, and went to join, the swollen ranks of the married in haste and separated at leisure.

Tall John ICnirns wrung his hands, and moaned that it. was the first time he had lieen locked up for being drunk. I’m glad lie spells his name with a K.” remarked Air Cairns feelingly. Everybody admitted it was a queer coloured horse. “It is the sort of a horse nobody could miss.” said a veterinary surgen. “ I have noticed it myself. You can’t describe it; it is just odd, and it is 25 years old. much too old to be on the streets of London. Tt is what you might call a conspicuous horse.”

The representative of a. firm of builders who owned the animated rainbow declined all responsibility. “ I know nothing about it,” he said fervently. “A ou ought to know something about it,” declared Afr Cairns. “The horse is old and lame, and it continues to work until the police step in and take a responsibility which belongs to the owners. You have had the benefit of a veterinary surgeon’s advice free of charge, and I hope you will pay the carman’s fine, 355.” “ It is a funny horse,” observed the warrant officer confidentially ns tlie court adjourned.