THE POLICE AND LUNATICS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 433, 24 January 1912, Page 2

THE POLICE AND LUNATICS.

"COME TO BOW STREET, AND

BRING YOUR BIBLE."

Sir Robert Anderson, continuing his reminiscences in "Blackwood's Magazine," refers to the trouble which the police receive from lunatics whose delusions have reference to Royalty. "It is remarkable how often mental aberration assumes this phase. This was a frequent cause of anxiety to the authorities, and of danger to the Sovereign, during all Queen Victoria's reign. "When I first came to London- a lunatic of this description gave the police no little trouble. One morning when he had announced his intention of going to Windsor, where the Queen was in residence, three officers were set to watch him. He got up steam by a couple of rounds of Hyde Park at five miles a n hour, and then headed for Windsor. One of the officers broke down before they had gone many miles ; another was done before they were half way ; and the third, who stuck to his man, was invalided for a week afterwards. But by the time the lunatic reached the Castle, the exercise had so soothed him that he quietly took train back to town. This sort of thing it was that precluded charging him before a magistrate, for in this frse country it is not illegal to take a twentymile walk at five miles an hour. "'But shortly afterwards Frederick Williamson called on him to see what he could make of him. He found the man in a state of great excitement, with a huge pulpit bible open before him. He had just made the momentous discovery that he was the Messiah ! Williamson urged on him that he was extremely wrong to keep the discovery to himself : he ought to make it known. But how ? " 'Come to Bow Street, and tell it to the Chief Magistrate in open court, and it will be published in every newspaper in London.' The man responded eagerly, and was ready in a moment. j " 'But,' said Williamson, 'you ! mustn't go without the Bible,' "A few minutes brought them to Bow Street in a hansome, a nd the poor fellow's dramatic announcement was followed, of course, by his committal to an asylum."