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Leader (1850-1860), 19th September 1857, Edition 2 of 2, Page 18, NIGHT POLICEMEN. Two cases heard a few d...

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      The Puffing Plague. There Will He Puller...

      -writer ?* It signifies , simply , that he hopes for work off a large edition . It is ludicrous enough to find ' critics' willing to aid in gulling- the devotees of the circulating library to write , ' Every page of . this work glitters with genius , ' or ia « gravea in letters of fire ; ' but these little j > ens will have their way , and not much harm is done when your friend , who has produced three volurcies of violent absurdity , is pronounced a female Juvena . Ii . In . the interest of literature , however , it is necessary ,

      reason after season , to protest against the columns of Bhop-made panegyric which assist in foisting dross and doggerel upon the •^ book-stalls . ' An excellent aiovel of country life ¦; ' < the remarkable talent displayed in this volume ; ' * the best collection of jokes ever made ; ' ' this volume bids fair to surpass all the other productions of the talented lad /; ' ' a most thrilling-. tale -of extraor--diaary adventures ; ' « told with so much 'truthfulness that the reader can hardly

      ima-. gme the story to be a fiction ; ' ' the most delightful book of travels ever writteil ; ' < one of the most delightfully written tales we have ever read / are not imagined idealities of criticism , but form a cluster culled from two -or ^ three ]) ages of a : single catalogue . Is this -criticism ? Clearly not , as no authorities are cited . Then , what is it ? Mere impertinence and imposture . We say again , we do not think that such clap-trap swill be abolished by being held up to shame ; but the public may be enlightened as to the value of * hose little corner paragraphs and fly-leaf

      panegyrics by which it is sought to get up false reputations , and to puff into notoriety the sweepings of English and American literature . When , after all forms of puffing have been exhausted in . vain , the book . remains unsold , a fresh title-page is printed . The volume formerly called The War in tlie JPwnjab , is now called The Bengal Mutiny . Misery , a tale of appalling interest reappears as Woe ! Woe ! a work which should be in every young lady ' s hands . It will come out next year as JSualine ; or , the Story of an Anguislied Heart . We shall be told , " This is a fiction of surpassing power . " But toko will tell us ? One who would as

      willingly indite the prais © of a pill or a paletot as promote the immortality of JEual-me . There may be no vice , no dishonesty in the practice ; but if it misleads the public , it is at least pernicious , and ought to be Jcnovm for what ib is . It is not to be imagined what rancid trash ia forced into circulation by these discreditable arts . Ever since the success of Uncle Tom , moreover , it Jias become the fashion to proclaim a sale of forty or a hundred thousand copies , and treaders are carried away by the fictitious

      tide . If , however , they would interpret all anonymous paragraphs of eulogy as mere catchpenny advertising , and discriminate between authoritative criticism and tho friendly exaggerations of minor prints , they might not be so often disappointed after purchasing ' the beat book of the season , price eightcenpence . ' You cannot walk a mile without - seeing four or five newspapers , each announced as * tho largest in the world , ' or a dozen shops , aa the * only shop where tho genuine article may be had ; ' and tho one puff is worth jusb as much as the other .

      G33 The Leader, [No. S91, Seggbmben 19,1...

      g 33 THE LEADER , [ No . S 91 , SEggBMBEn 19 , 185 T .

      Night Policemen. Two Cases Heard A Few D...

      NIGHT POLICEMEN . Two cases heard a few days ago at the Mansion House , suggest tho necessity of keeping the London police more strictly under surveillance . A luost rcspoctablo man was brought before the sitting justice charged with no offence whatever . Tho constable had 4 bu > seu . to fdnoy that 'ho was . after jio

      good' had apprehended him , and was in n ° way reprimanded for thus insulting a person upon whose character not the least suspicion rested . Of course , the accused individual was discharged . We are sorry that be seemed to take the matter very quietly , and expressed no determination to obtain redress for the unwaxu-antable and ignorant conduct of the policeman . On the same day , at the same court , a man and his wife were brought up and charged—with what ?

      A constable had seen them walking along a street in the City . He noticed that the woman had something . under her apron . He pounced upon her and demanded a satisfactory explanation of this occult proceeding . The simple pair , being alarmed , refused to give their names and addresses , and were hurried to the station-house , where it was found that the woman , being a shade above the class which scorns appearances , had been carrying a jug of beer which she had veiled from the public gaze with her apron .

      " Was there any circumstance known with respect to the prisoners ? " the magistrate asked . _ " Yes , sir ; they had changed a two-shilling piece . " " Was it a good one ?" " Yes , sir . " And this fool is in the police force ! But he is not the worst of his class . Among the policemen who do ' duty' at night in the metropolis are some of the most unmitigated ruffians out of the House of Correction . For a less offence than that of having a

      twoshilling piece in her possession , a harmless woman is sometimes dragged to the stationhouse by two half-tipsy guardians of the peace . More than one case of this kind has lately occurred . A few nights ago a crowd was gat tiered on a pavement near Regentstreet . A man had been beaten to the ground by several assailants , and , exactly in time to be too late to prevent this outrage , a pair of tall and brawny constables arrived . Without making a single inquiry , they seized vip on the prostrate individual and began dragging him away . A girl standing near exclaimed , " It is shameful ! " and for no other offence

      whatever she was brutally seized , pulled along , pushed to the ground , shaken when she fell , and finally incarcerated at the Yinestreet station . We make this statement because several persons desirous of interfering were refused admission to the inspector , and because formal complaints may be addressed to the authorities without the least

      result . We are far from wishing to prefer a sweeping accusation against tho general body of the night police—who , we suppose , are day-police in their turn—but many oi them are utterly unfitted , by their violent tempers , their tyrannical disposition , and their propensity to drink , from performing any of tho duties entrusted to them . The little

      despot of an alley who browbeats men , insults yomen , and applies his leathern-belt to children , ia the prowling fellow who haunts public-house doors to wheedle some one out of a pint of beer , nnd who will suilbr his hat to bo knocked off by a clamorous roisterer for aixpennyworth of gin . It is time that attention should bo called to this subject . What ia needed is a moro thorough

      inspection of tho beats after nightfall , and tho establishment of a rule by which the stations shall be opon to those who havo complaints or evidence to prefer . Nominally they may be so , but practically , when tho policeman has deter mined to ' lock-up' any poor woman by whom his dignity has been ollbnded , she is thrust in , the doors are slammod , tho inmates aro deaf to remonstrance , and when tho commissioners are addroBsed they reply by a

      printed foxm promising to inquire ! INotui ™ more is heard of the case , and the victim of police brutality is often glad to be let out in the morning without being brought up before the magistrate . Sometimes / however the case is heard ,, and it comes out that the police are in the habit of arresting one person be cause they think he is ' after no good ; ' and another because lie has changed a two ' -sliilling piece , a . veritable ' coin of the realm

      Att] La At Galloway. A "Wigtownshire Con...

      ATT ] LA AT GALLOWAY . A "Wigtownshire contemporary courteously invites us to explain why we said that Charles Martel . defeated the hordes of Attila , when we should have separated the two events , and said that on the plain consecrated to the Garde Imperiale Attila was defeated in the fifth century , whereas Martel did not defeat the Saracens on . the same spot till the eighth . Why -we wrote so slovenly a sentence we cannot now ascertain , since our notes were clear ; so we have determined to lay it on the printer . It is curious , ' bv-the-by , that Chateaubriand throws hot the slightest light upon the subject in his historical essay on Alala ! We can , however , scarcely regret our hideous lapsus t or rather paralysis calami , since it lias drawn out our accomplished and amiable censor in Bip-wigtownshire , with ' whose zeal on . the right appreciation of Attila we heartily sympathize .

      If we erred , who has not ? On second thoughts , these foTgetfulnesses arc a proof of wisdom and of wit . How many instances crowd upon us ? Lord Bolingbroke imagined that in those famous verses , beginning with Excudenl alii , & c , Virgil attributed to the Itomans the glory of having surpassed the Greeks in historical composition . According to his idea , those Roman historians whom Virgil preferred to the Grecians were Sallust , Liv . y . and Tucif ' us . Yet

      was not Virgil dead before Livy had written Iijs history , and before Tacitus was born ? But there are other blunders besides anachronisms . The Abbe Bizofc , tlie .-aufcUQr . of . the lModullio history -of Holland , fell into a droll mistake . There is a medal , struck when Philip II . set forth his Invincible Armada ., on which are represented the King of Spain , the Emperor , the Pope , Electors , Cardinals , & c , with then eyes covered with a bandage , and bearing for inscription this fine verse of Lucretius : —

      " O coecas honiiuum mentes ! O pectora cajca !" The Abbe , prepossessed with the prejudice that a nation persecuted by the . Pope and his adherents could not , represent them without some insult , did not examine with sufficient care the ends of the bandag-cs which covered the eyes and waved about the heads of the personages represented on this medal ; lie rashly took them for asses' cch'x , and as sucli they arc engraved ! Yet how learned was Bizot ! how clever Bolingbroke !

      1ms Atlantic Tki/Egkapii.—The Amorican P...

      1 ms Atlantic Tki / egkapii . —The Amorican papers publish , a letter from Captain Hudson ( of tho Niagara , engaged in laying down the Atlantic telegraph ) to the Secretary of tho United States Navy , in which he says : — " I have tho honour , as well aa the mortification , to report the arrival of the Niagara at this port . ( Plymouth , England ) , after having run out three hundred and thirtyfour miles of the telegraphic cubic , some portions of it ia a depth of over two thousand and lifty fathoms , or moro than two miles and a quarter , whun it wn * broken by too much pressure on the hrenk attached to iho machinery for paying it out . I have every reason to believe , from what we have thus far cxperiunei'd in wire laying , [ that under ordinary circumstances of weather ,

      and machinery adapted to tho purpose—for such its wo have on board requires altering and improving—tho cable may be laid in safety on the track marked out over the Atlantic Ocojui . At the time tho cubic purled—August 11 , 5 J . 15 a . m . —tho ship was going nhnuj four knots , nnd had been running at the rate . of from three to four knots through tho night , with sonic motion from a moderate head sea , and tho company ' s chief engineer nnd men attending their breaks to lessen the expenditure of cubic , until they finally curried it , away , which made all hand * of us through the day like a household or family which had lost their dearest friend , for oll ' iecrs nnd men hud become deoply interested in the hucci'sh of tho enterprise . "

      Mkizurh ok ( . UmvdUAVtox Efi-k < t , s i-oii Dorni-B Inooiui « -tax . — -The collectors of income-tax at . North Shiokls , acting under tho order of tho authorities at Somemit-houno , huvo seized the baths and wn . sh-lnmscu belonging to tho corporation of Tynomoul . h for their share of a reiiBRCB . sincnt of income-tax to m . iko up : i defalcation of 17001 . by a collector named llriggs . Tho corporation have given notice that they intend to- try tho question in a court of hivr .

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 19, 1857, page 18, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_19091857/page/18/