CRIMINALS AND THEIR WAYS.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VIII, Issue 2422, 11 October 1886, Page 3

CRIMINALS AND THEIR WAYS.

Criminalsglidebftok to their own haunts nnd their old companions with fatal facility, There may seem the fairest hopes of reformation, but at the first fire.. of temptation, the' frostwork'o-f new , habits melts away at once, .There i 3 a atory that a man bought bno day, at an ; old curiosity shop at Rome, a ring, with , a secret spring, in wlnch : pt)ison had been imbedded ever since tiio days of the Borgias, and the ancient venom, had still sufficient strength to poison him, There i is a story of a girl of Indian blood' who 1 to bo fully reclaimedto 1 civilization; when somooffonce had been ,! given her by her mistress, slio tore up her : clothes, squatted on tho ground, mid , howled, Keen insight into human nature ' is exhibited by Victor Hugo when he Ulakes Joan Valjcan, even after the forgivenoss and generosity of ; the good . bishop, rob tho little Savoyatd of | hi 3 two-franc piece, It was the i temporary assertion of the tyranny ' of dejjraved habits. " Now, . here ' is a I'uniflfcable case for you," said a great pmli autliority one day, " 1 knew ut man who lay under sentence of punishment of death, If was cither for murder or for burglary, ■ for the sentence was passed a little while before the death j penalty for burglary'was abolished. If for ] murder it must have been with extcnua- i ting circumstances,; for the extreme sen- j tcnced win commuted into Iransportation ; for life. He went Out to Western j Australia, and there behaved so well that , he departed for another part of Australia i with ii free pardon, lie came to one of tho great Australian towns and becamoa 1 couskble, and became chief constable. J ThonTe'thought he wuuld come over to ' London for a time, Mb did s», and had i not been in London many weeks before < ho met with some of his own pals in the ' Strand, got mixed up in smiie of their j evil ways and was sent back tu Australia \ as ut convict. 1 can tell you we see some < very queer tilings, we who are connected with the convict system. In this very 1 room where we are, there were two men ! talking one morning. The one was the : old Marquis of . Westminister and the other was a released convict. The marquis didn't know it was a convict, and the convict didn't know it was a marquis. " I think the edn'vicb liavo not so much ■ to complain of, and enjoy an extremely healthy air at Poitbiml," says flic mar- ■ quia. 11 ltwwe with ywi, sir," said the convict, w! happen to' have spent a good ilealXtjm'c there' myself.—All the , yearlound. . < g—■ " 11