The Royal Mail Part 12

Other instances of such gentleman-like performances in waylaying the post were not unknown in the primitive days of the Post-office, for about the year 1658 the following notice was issued for the discovery of a gentleman of the law who had taken to evil ways by intercepting the mail:--"Whereas Mr Herbert Jones, attorney-at-law in the town of Monmouth, well known by being several years together under-sheriff of the same county, hath of late divers times robbed the mail coming from that town to London, and taken out divers letters and writs, and is now fled from justice," &c.

In August 1692, the postboy riding the last stage towards Edinburgh with the mail from England, was robbed on the 13th of that month, at a short distance from Edinburgh. A record of the period relates that the robbery was committed by "a person mounted on horseback with a sword about him, and another person on foot with a pistol in his hand, upon the highway from Haddington to Edinburgh, near that place thereof called Jock's Lodge (a mile from town) about ten hours of the night." The robbers took "the packet or common mail, with the horse whereon the boy rode." A proclamation was issued by the Scottish Privy Council, offering a reward of a hundred pounds for the apprehension of the offenders, with a free pardon to any one of them who should inform upon the rest; but with what result is not known.

On the 13th September 1786, the mail-rider from the North charged with the conveyance of mails for Edinburgh, having reached Kinross about midnight, proceeded to change horses as usual in a stable-yard at that place. The mail-bags he deposited on the back of a chaise in the yard until he should be ready to resume his journey. As was his custom, he then went into the stable to give a feed of corn to his horse; but while so engaged, the bags were abstracted and the contents stolen. Two brothers, who were proved to have been in the neighbourhood at the time, and to whom some of the stolen property was traced, were arraigned for the crime before the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh, and being found guilty, were sentenced to be executed.

The following is a somewhat fuller account of a post, robbery on the public road, which occurred a few years later:--

In 1802, the mails between Edinburgh and Glasgow were still conveyed by men travelling on horseback--the route taken being by way of Falkirk--the hour of despatch from Glasgow being 9 P.M., and the hour of arrival in Edinburgh about 6 A.M. or 7 A.M. The riders of this mail seem to have had sections of the road apportioned to them--one rider covering the road from Glasgow to Falkirk, the other taking the stage from Falkirk to Edinburgh. On the morning of the 1st of August in that year, the rider for the east stage--named William Wilson--received the Glasgow mail-bag entire and duly sealed at Falkirk, and thereafter set out towards Edinburgh. When he approached a rising ground called Sighthill--probably a wooded knoll bearing that name, about three miles from Linlithgow, on the road to Polmont--he observed two men coming down towards him, and who, so soon as they got near him, placed themselves one on each side of his horse, and immediately seized him. One of the two men held something in his hand, and threatened Wilson that if he offered to speak his brains would be blown out. Then he was led away into a field of corn, where he was blindfolded by one of the men with his own handkerchief, and his hands tied behind his back; thereupon he was thrown down, and his legs bound together to prevent his getting free. Meanwhile the other man led off the horse and rifled the mail. The post-rider remained in his unhappy position for about an hour, when he managed to extricate himself, and proceeding to the first house he could reach, implored the inmates "for G.o.d's sake" to let him in, as he had been robbed. Having been admitted and obtained a.s.sistance, he returned to the scene of his adventure, and found the empty mail-bag at the foot of a haystack, while the horse was recovered a little distance away. The mail contained bills, &c., for something like 1300 or 1400.

The robbery of the mail caused great excitement in Edinburgh so soon as it became known, and no long time elapsed before the perpetrators were in the hands of the authorities. The two men concerned in it proved to be James Clark _alias_ Alex. Stewart, and Robert Brown, formerly privates in the Foot Guards. No sooner had they got back to Edinburgh--where they had previously lodged--than they commenced to change some of the bank-notes taken from the mail-bag, and got the worse of drink; and being once suspected, the evidence soon acc.u.mulated and became strong against them. They were tried for the offence before the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh in November following, and being found guilty, were sentenced to be executed.

This robbery would appear to have had the effect of stirring up the public mind to demand a means of conveying the mails between the two cities affording greater security; for an agitation immediately followed for the setting up of coaches or diligences to carry the mails between those cities. Owing, however, to difficulties and disagreements between the merchants and traders as to the hours of departure and arrival, and to wranglings over the particular route to be journeyed, the idea was abandoned, and the horse-post as of old was meanwhile continued. The robbery seems not to have been soon forgotten, however; for we find that towards the close of 1802 a proposal was made to enter into an agreement for the service with "an officer of the Mid-Lothian Cavalry, and master of the Riding Academy in Edinburgh," who offered to conduct and carry on the service in a masterly and military manner for an allowance of 450 per annum--the riders to be employed being none other than able and active dragoons. But in the nature of things such a mail service could not continue, and negotiations still proceeded for the employment of diligences--not resulting in success, however, until the year 1805, when the first mail-coach between Edinburgh and Glasgow was put upon the road.

A somewhat similar attack upon a postboy was made in Yorkshire in the year 1798, when the rider's life was threatened by a highwayman single-handed, and the mails stolen from him. The case is interesting owing to the fact that traces of the robbery were obtained so recently as 1876, though at the period of its occurrence no trace of the highwayman or of his plunder could be discovered.

The official account of the robbery, when it happened, was as follows:--

"The postboy coming from Selby to York was robbed of his mail between six and seven o'clock this evening. About three miles on this side of Selby he was accosted by a man on foot, with a gun in his hand, who asked him if he was the postboy, and at the same time seized hold of the bridle. Without waiting for any answer, he told the boy he must immediately unstrap the mail and give it him, pointing the muzzle of the gun at him whilst he did it. When he had given up the mail, the boy begged he would not hurt him; to which the man replied he need not be afraid, and at the same time pulled the bridle from the horse's head.

The horse immediately galloped off with the boy, who had never dismounted.

"He was a stout man, dressed in a drab jacket, and had the appearance of being a heckler. The boy was too much frightened to make any other remark on his person, and says he was totally unknown to him. The mail contained the bags for Howden and London, Howden and York, and Selby and York."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Selby Mail-Bag.]

Although a reward of 200 was offered for the discovery of the robber, and a free pardon to any accessory who might turn accuser, nothing was heard of the matter at the time, though suspicion, it is said, pointed to some of the inhabitants of Selby. The robbery might perhaps have remained forgotten, but that, upon a public-house situated on the Churchhill, Selby, being pulled down in 1876, a suit of clothes, a sou'-wester hat, and an old mail-bag marked "Selby" were found in the roof. There is little doubt that these were the clothes worn by the robber on the occasion under notice, and that the bag (which is a sort of waterproof-pouch, furnished with two straps to pa.s.s over the shoulders) is the identical bag which contained the mails stolen in 1798. When the foundations of this old public-house were turned up, the discovery was made of several coffins containing bodies in a good state of preservation--a circ.u.mstance, when taken in connection with the traces of the mail-robbery and the public character of the house, ominous in the extreme. The case is one which might be taken as somewhat proving the suggestion put forward by Smollett in 'Roderick Random' as to the intimate relations which existed between the _personnel_ of the innkeepers and the common highwaymen--the former being well aware of the profession followed by the latter, if not actually sharers in their plunder.

The ill.u.s.tration of the Selby bag is from a photograph. The bag, when folded for the postboy's back, measured about 17 inches broad by 15 inches deep.

On Wednesday the 23d October 1816, at half-past nine in the evening, the postboy carrying the mail-bags from Teignmouth and neighbouring places to Exeter, was a.s.saulted "in a most desperate and inhuman manner" near the village of Alphington, and plundered of the Teignmouth and Exminster bags. The poor man was attacked with such fury that he was felled from his horse, came to the ground on his head, which was fractured in two places, and in consequence of his injuries, he remained insensible for some time. When he regained consciousness in the Exeter Hospital, whither he had been conveyed, he was able to explain that, at the time of the attack, he was walking his horse up a hill, that the a.s.sailant was a young man, and that he was mounted on a grey horse. This horse was supposed afterwards to be traced, though the robber failed to be discovered, notwithstanding that a reward of 50 was offered for his discovery and conviction. "A horse exactly answering the description,"

says an official record, "was taken from a field near Dawlish on the Wednesday night, and turned back to the same place before daybreak on Thursday, having evidently been rode very fast, and gored very much in the sides." The owner of the horse could give no a.s.sistance in the matter, nor had he suspicions against any one; so that it would appear the robber had taken the horse surrept.i.tiously for his purpose. The mail-bags were afterwards recovered, with some few of the letters opened: but it did not appear that any property was missing. The unfortunate rider, whose name was "Caddy," remained in hospital till the January following, when he was discharged; but in the month of May his wounds broke out afresh, and he had to return to hospital, being now become subject to epileptic fits owing to his injuries. As he was no longer able for service, he was granted a gratuity by the Post-office; and it is not probable that he survived very long thereafter. With the mere expectation of getting some little gain from the robbery, the marauder had all but killed the poor postboy, who had a wife and two children dependent on him; and he has in his evil-doing given a good example of what Burns calls "man's inhumanity to man," that "makes countless thousands mourn."

In the year 1797 the deputy-postmaster of the Orkneys and his son, a lad of about sixteen years of age, were tried at the High Court of Justiciary, Edinburgh, on a charge of breaking open certain post-letters while in their custody in course of transit, and therefrom abstracting money. The indictment contained a further charge of forgery against the elder prisoner, the deputy having endorsed another person's name upon a money-order contained in one of the stolen letters. The thefts were committed at different times in 1794 and 1796, and the specific cases upon which evidence was led were in respect of the following letters--viz., two letters sent at different times to Orkney by a seaman in the Royal Navy, one containing a guinea-note and half a guinea in gold, the other containing either a guinea in gold or a note for that amount; a letter from London for Orkney, containing a money-order for 5 5s.; and a letter from Perth for Orkney, enclosing a note for a guinea: the whole amount involved being under 9.

In the course of the trial it was proved that the deputy was guilty, certain of the missing letters having been found in his house, and the son had already confessed to what was charged against him. The whole cases were clearly made out to the satisfaction of the jury, who returned a verdict accordingly against both prisoners, but with a recommendation of mercy towards the son of the deputy, on the score of his tender years. Sentence was p.r.o.nounced on the 5th September, and the date of execution fixed for the 18th October. By the exercise of the Royal prerogative, George III. granted a free pardon to the deputy's son, who was forthwith set at liberty; but it is a melancholy reflection, that for delinquencies involving the loss of so small a sum as 9, the deputy-postmaster should, on the date fixed for his execution, have actually been led forth to his doom. In a report of the circ.u.mstance written at the time, it is stated "that he was attended by the Rev. Mr Black of Lady Yester's, and Mr Struthers of the Relief congregation, and behaved in a manner suitable to his unhappy situation!" G.o.d forbid that there should be a standard of deportment for occasions like this, where, to our more humane notions, the punishment so fearfully outweighs the offence.

Early in the year 1849 a sad blow fell upon the postmaster of a certain town in Wales, on its being discovered that an a.s.sistant in his office, a daughter of his own, had been stealing post-letters. In the course of investigations made into her misdoings, it was discovered that the thefts had been going on for a period of seven years, during which time she had acc.u.mulated as much jewellery and haberdashery as would have stocked a small shop--and besides, money to the amount of 95. The letters from which the property had been taken were between two and three hundred, and these she had kept, so that it was possible to restore to the owners, in many cases, the stolen articles. On the 20th March the unfortunate and misguided creature was tried, on the charge of stealing a particular letter, and was convicted--the sentence pa.s.sed upon her being _transportation for ten years_.

It was afterwards ascertained that the motive underlying this long career of thieving was a desire to ama.s.s such a dowry as would improve her prospects in the matter of obtaining a husband.

_Hatton Garden Robbery._

On Thursday the 16th November 1881, the whole country was made aware, through the daily papers, that a most daring Post-office robbery had been committed in London the previous afternoon, the scene of the event being the Hatton Garden Branch Office, situated in the busy district of Holborn. The time and plan of carrying out the undertaking were not such as are usually chosen for attempts of this kind, the hour at which the robbery was effected being 5 P.M., when the office was thronged with the public purchasing stamps, or doing other business in view of the night-mail despatch. Nor was there any furtive mode of proceeding in the ordinary sense, but a bold and dashing stroke for the chances of success or failure.

On the afternoon of the day of the robbery, a murky fog, such as Londoners know so well and heartily dislike, hung over the metropolis.

The street lamps afforded but a dull light in the thoroughfares; shops and offices were lighted up for the evening's business; and the afternoon's work in the Hatton Garden Post-office was at its height (the registered-letter bag, containing some forty registered letters, having just been deposited in an ordinary bag hanging from a peg in the office), when suddenly, and without apparent cause, the whole of the lights in the office went out, and the place was plunged in almost total darkness. Consternation took possession of the female clerks behind the counter, while young clerks and boys from warehouses and offices, conceiving the occasion to be one for noise and merriment, helped to increase the confusion by clamour and hubbub outside the counter. No long time elapsed before matches were obtained and tapers lit, when it was immediately discovered that the tap of the gas-meter in the bas.e.m.e.nt had been turned off; but on the tap being turned on again, the jets in the office were relit, and the place resumed its wonted appearance. The young ladies in the office being now able to see around them, soon detected the absence of the bag, which had been left hanging on the peg, and which they knew had not yet been despatched by them. It did not take long to realise that the bag had vanished--in fact, had been stolen; and to this day the property contained in the lost registered letters has not been recovered, nor have the persons concerned in the theft been traced.

It is believed that two or more individuals were engaged in the robbery, the supposition being that one person got down into the bas.e.m.e.nt without attracting attention, and turned off the gas, while another, so soon as darkness supervened, got by some means within the counter, and, un.o.bserved, took the bag from the peg--all concerned making good their escape in the midst of the stir and noise by which they were surrounded.

The whole adventure bears the impress of having been carefully planned and cleverly executed, and there is little doubt that the robbery was carried out by men who were experts in their nefarious calling.

The value of the articles contained in the forty registered letters was about 15,000; and as the scene of the robbery lay in the midst of diamond merchants and jewellers, it is not surprising that precious stones and jewellery were the princ.i.p.al contents of these letters.

Besides watches, bracelets set with pearls and diamonds, ear-rings, rings, &c., the following articles were among the property stolen--viz., eight parcels of rough diamonds, 147 turquoises, a quant.i.ty of small emeralds, 6000 drilled sapphires, 2000 pairs of garnet bores, 240 pairs of sapphire bores, a quant.i.ty of sapphires weighing 695 carats, several rubies and sapphires weighing 546 carats, &c., &c.

A reward of 200 was offered by the Postmaster-General, and a further reward of 1000 by certain insurance companies who had insured the valuable letters, for the conviction of the delinquents and the recovery of the stolen property; but the robbery remains to this day one of those which have baffled the skill of the Metropolitan police and the officers of the Post-office to unravel or to bring home to the evil-doers.

_Cape Diamond Robbery._

The greater portion of the diamonds found in Griqualand West, in South Africa, are sent weekly to England through the Post-office, made up in packets, which are forwarded as registered letters--the value of these remittances being collectively from 60,000 to 100,000. In April 1880, the sailing of the mail-steamer from Cape Town having been delayed until the day after the arrival of the up-country mails, the bag containing the registered correspondence was left in the registered-letter office of the Cape Town Post-office; not, however, locked up in the safe, where it ought to have been, but carelessly left underneath one of the tables.

During the night the office was broken into, and the whole of the diamonds stolen, valued at 60,000. Who the robbers were appears never to have been discovered, and they have doubtless since been in the enjoyment of the fruits of their villainous enterprise. As it is the practice of people in the diamond trade to insure packets of diamonds sent by them, the senders did not suffer anything beyond inconvenience by this robbery; but the insurance companies were involved in the loss, and had to pay claims amounting to 60,000.

The following is an account of a robbery attempted upon a postman in London in July 1847, as officially reported at the time:--

"An attempt was this morning made to murder or seriously to maim Bradley, the Lombard Street letter-carrier, with a view of obtaining possession of the letters for his district. He was pa.s.sing through Mitre Court, a narrow pa.s.sage between Wood Street and Milk Street, when the gate of the Court was closed and locked behind him with a skeleton key by, it is believed, three men, who followed him a few yards farther on in the pa.s.sage. On Bradley getting to a wider part of the Court, one of them felled him to the ground by a heavy blow from a life-preserver; he attempted to rise, but was again knocked down in a similar manner. He then felt that they tried to force from him his letter-bags, but fortunately the mouths of them were, for security, twisted round his arm. They continued their blows; but Bradley retained sufficient consciousness to call out 'Murder!' so as to be heard by some of the porters in the adjoining warehouses, who ran to see what was the matter, but unluckily the villains escaped. Poor Bradley is most seriously injured--so much so that he may be considered in some danger."

An idea of the amount of property the thieves would have obtained had Bradley not held the bags tightly (even under such circ.u.mstances), may be formed from the fact that he had in his possession thirty-seven registered letters containing property, besides all the other letters for Messrs Overend, Gurney, & Co., Robarts, Curtis, & Co., Glynn & Co., the London and County Bank, as well as those for thirty-four other houses in Lombard Street. It was believed at the time that the value of the property in Bradley's possession amounted to hundreds of thousands of pounds.

A daring robbery of a Berlin postman occurred not very long ago, when the outrage was accompanied by a still more atrocious crime--the murder of the postman. The man was one of a cla.s.s who deliver money remittances at the addresses of the persons to whom they are sent, under a system which prevails in some countries of the Continent, and he had with him cash and notes to the amount of some 1500. The robber and murderer, a man of great bodily strength, had so arranged that a small remittance would fall to be delivered at his address on Monday morning--an occasion when a large number of remittances are received; and on the postman reaching the place, and proceeding to pay the requisite sum, the occupier of the premises felled him with a hammer, and with repeated blows killed him outright. It was evident from the circ.u.mstances that the murderer had duly planned the outrage, for the room rented was near to the starting-point of the postman, so that he should not have paid away any portion of his charge when he reached the room. The body of the poor postman was found afterwards cold and stiff, lying in a pool of blood, with his empty and rifled bag beside him; and the weapon with which the perpetrator had achieved the murder, remained there as a witness of the crime. The murderer was said to have previously served in a cuira.s.sier regiment. Before decamping, he had turned the key in the door of his room; and the discovery was only made after a search by the Post-office authorities at the addresses at which the postman had to call, on his failing to return later in the day.

Some years ago the following extensive robbery of letters occurred in London. An unusually large number of complaints were found to be reaching the General Post-office, of the non-receipt by merchants, bankers, and others carrying on business in Lombard Street and its neighbourhood, of letters containing bank-notes, cheques, advices, and important correspondence, sent to them from all parts of the kingdom.

The circ.u.mstance naturally gave rise to careful inquiry on the part of the Post-office authorities, with the result that suspicion fell upon a young postman of nineteen years of age, through whose hands many of the missing letters would in ordinary course have to pa.s.s. Certain Bank of England notes, which had been contained in some of the letters, were found to have been cashed; and the names endorsed upon them, though fict.i.tious, were in a handwriting resembling that of the young man suspected. Thereupon he was arrested and searched, when in a pocketbook on his person were found two 5 notes, which had been forwarded from Norfolk to a banking-house in London, but had failed to reach their destination. In a pocket in his official coat were found also some thirty-five letters of various dates, which he had neglected to deliver, to the inconvenience or loss no doubt of the persons addressed; but the most astonishing part of the business is, that when his locker or cupboard at the General Post-office was examined, about 1500 letters were found there which he had stopped, the dates upon the envelopes showing that his delinquencies had extended over several months. This young man, upon being tried for the offences named, was convicted, and with the usual severity observed in similar circ.u.mstances, the judge pa.s.sed upon the prisoner a sentence of six years' penal servitude.

The following curious instance of the wholesale misappropriation of post-letters also came under the notice of the Post-office authorities in London a few years ago:--

A man was observed one day carrying off some boards from a building in course of erection in the Wandsworth Bridge Road, Fulham, and being pursued by a constable, he dropped the timber and made off. The man was, however, captured and taken to the police-station, whereupon the place where he lived was searched for other stolen property. His habitation was situated upon a waste piece of ground on the banks of the Thames, the erection being of wood built upon piles, and so placed as to be almost entirely surrounded by water. Here this man, who was a barge-owner, and who was pa.s.sing under an a.s.sumed name, had lived in isolation for about a year; the position selected for his home being one calculated to afford him that complete seclusion from social intercourse which would seem to have been his aim. In the course of their examination of the contents of the hut, the police found not only more stolen timber, but various other articles, the chief of which, in the present connection, were a large lot of post-letters, mail-bags, and articles of postmen's clothing, besides milk-cans and a case of forty rifles. As the inquiry proceeded, it became known that the prisoner was a Post-office pensioner, having been superannuated from his office of postman some three years previously, after having served in that capacity a period of fifteen years. It would seem that his official delinquencies had extended over some six or eight years; but so far as the letters showed, theft in the ordinary sense could hardly have been the man's purpose, inasmuch as the letters had not been opened, with one exception, and in this instance the person for whom the letter was intended could not be found. The motive underlying this free departure from the ways of honesty seems to have had its root in simple acquisitiveness; the hundredweight of letters, book-packets, &c., the old mail-bags, discarded uniforms, and waste official papers (not to mention the thirty milk-cans, supposed to have been picked up when going his rounds as a postman, and the case of rifles), having been turned to no profitable account. Had the superannuated postman opened the letters found in his premises, the punishment which would have followed would necessarily have been severe. As the case stood, however, he was merely charged under the Post-office Acts with their unlawful detention, and sentence was pa.s.sed upon him of eighteen months' imprisonment with hard labour. It seems astonishing that this postman should have had the folly to retain about him so long the evidences of his errors, which might at any time have been brought up against him; but, perhaps, the feeling prompting this may be akin to that which leads criminals to visit the scenes of former iniquities, even when incurring the risk of discovery, and if discovered, of certain punishment.

The following is a case of robbery which occurred in 1883, as reported by the newspapers of the day, the culprit being quite a young person:--

"The most destructive and important case of robbery in connection with Mr Fawcett's plan, introduced some two or three years ago, for facilitating the placing of small sums, by means of postage-stamps, in the Post-office Savings Bank, came before the Bristol magistrates to-day, when Ellen Hunt, a domestic servant, about sixteen years of age, was charged with stealing a large number of letters, some of them containing cheques, the property of the Postmaster-General. Mr Clifton, who prosecuted, said the robberies were of a very extensive character, and might have been fraught with the direst consequences. They had been discovered in a singular manner, no money having been missed: but a large number of circular letters, addressed by the Bristol clerk to officials requiring to be sworn in connection with the School Board election this week, miscarried. Inquiries were made by the Postal authorities, when it was found that all these circulars had been posted at the Redcliffe district office, where the prisoner was the servant of the postmaster, Mr Devine. It was the custom of Mr Devine to place the key of the letter-box in a secret place for the use of himself and his a.s.sistants; but the prisoner discovered it, and the circular letters were found in her possession with the postage-stamps off them. They had been removed for payment into the Post-office Savings Bank on the forms by which a shilling's worth of postage-stamps saved up by school-children and others is now accepted by the Savings Bank department of the Post-office; but the most serious part of the case was the fact that in the prisoner's box were discovered the bundles of opened letters now produced by Detective Short, and containing cheques already discovered to the amount of 74, 16s., all of which had been sent through the same post-office. The charge was laid under the 27th section of the Act, but formerly a prisoner would have been liable for such an offence to transportation for life. Some evidence having been given, the girl, who was hysterical throughout the hearing, was remanded. Apparently no effort had been made to deal with the cheques, but the detective stated that the numerous letters had been opened."

_Tale of a Banker's Letter._

Towards the close of last century, or early in the present century, a tradesman of the better cla.s.s carrying on business in a certain town of the west of England, which we shall here call X----, and who also added to his ordinary business that of the agency of a bank, posted a bulky letter containing heavy remittances in notes, addressed to the Bank of England. This letter never reached its destination, and the loss, being of a most serious kind, was soon bruited about, and became the theme, locally, of general conversation. As it happened, the sender was a man of strong political opinions, and having courage to express them, there were many persons holding opposite views who not only regarded him with feelings akin to dislike, but were ready to take up any missile which chance might place in their way to damage their adversary's fair name.

While, therefore, the bank agent maintained that he had posted the letter in question, insinuations were set afloat to the effect that he had not done so, and that the object of his allegations was to fend off pressing calls in matters of account. He suffered greatly in reputation from these unsupported stories, though there was nothing else in his circ.u.mstances to create suspicion. Time, the great anodyne of scandal, had somewhat a.s.suaged the sufferings of the unfortunate banker, and probably softened the unkind feelings of those who had been disposed to think hardly of him; the loss of the letter itself had ceased to attract attention; and as yet nothing was heard of the letter, or the valuable enclosures which it had contained.

At length, however, the agent received intimation that one of the missing notes--a Bank of England note for 50--which was _stopped_ at that establishment, had been presented in London. As the result of inquiries which were made, it was now traced to an old-established silversmith somewhere in the city of London; but beyond this point the search failed, for all the account the silversmith could give was, that he had received the note some time previously from a man of respectable appearance, who had the exterior and conversation of what might be a well-to-do west-country farmer. This man was accompanied to his shop by a young woman of the flash type, to whom the stranger presented two or three rings; purchasing for himself some heavy gold seals, such as were in vogue at the period, a silver tankard or two, and several punch-ladles. In payment of these articles the 50 note was pa.s.sed, but the silversmith could give no further help; though hope was not yet extinct, for he added that he should certainly recognise his customers, were they ever to come under his observation again.

The man of X---- was a man of determination, and, still smarting under the loss of means and honour, he resolved that, sooner or later, he should discover by whom his letter had been stolen. The silversmith, readily entering into these views, cordially offered his personal services, and it was arranged between the banker and himself that they should ransack London, visiting the Ranelahs, the Vauxhalls, the Parks, the theatres--indeed every place where gay women and men of pleasure might be found together. This was an arduous task; but in the end their perseverance was rewarded by the discovery of the young woman to whom the farmer had presented the rings. On being questioned, this young person, while frankly stating what she knew, had little to tell. She had, she said, been in Snow Hill or Holborn one morning at the hour of the arrival of the west of England mail-coach. Among the pa.s.sengers who got down was a youngish, fresh-looking farmer, whose acquaintance she then made, and whose constant companion she was for several days thereafter. She still wore the articles of jewellery which had been presented to her; but she declared that she had never seen the man since, nor did she know his name. And here the inquiry again seemed to exhaust itself, in the vague discovery of a _west-country farmer_.

The acquaintance between the banker and the silversmith, which had come about in the way already stated, soon ripened into friendship. They had, in a greater or less degree, a common interest in the matter of the stolen note, but they soon found out that there was other common ground for the growth of amity between them--they were both disciples of Izaak Walton. It became the custom of the silversmith to visit at the house of his friend in the west every season, when the two men would go out fishing together in the neighbouring streams, enjoying each other's society, and frequently, no doubt, going over again the old story of the lost letter. One day, during such a visit, the silversmith went out alone to try a stream not many miles distant from his friend's residence, and while so engaged a heavy shower swept across the scene.

The angler sought shelter in a roadside inn, from which, as it happened, he was not far distant. The house was well known, and the proprietor was of the half-farmer, half-publican type, the business of innkeeper in such a situation not affording a sufficient living by itself. Feeling somewhat peckish, the visitor called for lunch. He was waited upon by the landlord in person. While the bread and cheese and cider were being carried in, the landlord apologised for the absence of the female folks, who were for the moment engaged elsewhere; and during this brief conversation, the silversmith (still instinct with professional taste) studied a bunch of heavy seals hanging from a watch in the landlord's fob. The landlord perceived that these articles had attracted the stranger's notice, and when he again came into the room the fact was observed by the other that they had been left aside or placed out of sight.

This incident set the stranger thinking; and while so engaged, his eye fell upon an old-fashioned gla.s.s-fronted cupboard occupying a corner of the room, in which were exhibited the inn treasures--old crystal vessels, china bowls, and the like--together with the plate of the establishment. A sudden thought struck him. He proceeded to examine the contents of the repository; and, standing upon a chair to explore the upper shelves, what was his amazement when he there recognised the silver tankards and the silver punch-ladles which he had sold to the west-country farmer many years before! Then, eagerly turning over the whole matter in his mind, the features of the landlord came back upon him, and in this man he recognised the person who in London had purchased these articles and paid to him the stolen 50 Bank of England note. The silversmith lost no time in communicating the facts to the banker, who at once obtained a warrant, and, with two constables, proceeded the same evening to the inn to put it into execution. The landlord was called into a room, there and then he was charged with having stolen the note, and was forthwith conveyed into X---- a prisoner.

It transpired in the course of inquiries that in his early days--before the period of the robbery--this man had been employed as a servant or a.s.sistant by the postmaster at X----. He left that situation, however, and became coachman to one of the neighbouring gentry. While in this service it was very frequently his duty to drive the family into town, where they would rest some portion of the day in their town house, and return to the country seat in the evening. In these intervals it sometimes happened that the coachman would go to the post-office, and there chat and gossip with his old fellow-servants. He visited the post-office on the day when the stolen letter was posted; he and his former comrades smoked and drank together; and in the end he volunteered to a.s.sist with the letters. He did so; and while thus engaged he managed to abstract the banker's letter, which, owing to its bulky nature and the address which it bore, he suspected to contain value. His visit on that particular day was verified by circ.u.mstances in the recollection of the persons at the post-office, and other evidence of his guilt acc.u.mulated against him; but this testimony was not really necessary, for the farmer-publican himself confessed to the theft of the letter, and explained how he had obtained possession of it.

The course usual in such circ.u.mstances followed. The offence was visited with the severity which characterised the period--the man suffered the extreme penalty of the law.