be deaf and dumb, was brought up in custody, having
been found lying drunk on the pavement on Sunday
evening. He wrote on his slate, in a good firm hand,
that the landlords and landladies of the town had
behaved in a shameful way to him, by refusing him a bed,
but that if he was liberated for this time he would leave
the town directly. On searching his pockets, the
constable turned out a Prayer-book, and some written
prayers and cards, which he offered to the notice of the
humane and benevolent; and amongst the collection
appeared several memorandum books, by which it was
clearly proved that he kept a daily entry of his collections
and expenditure, as well as the "Beggar's Directory,"
containing the names and residences of the charitable
throughout the kingdom, with the roosting-places for the
night. Some idea may be formed of the amount of money
collected by these vagabonds, when it appears from this
man's cash-book, that the islands of Jersey and Guernsey
furnished him with the sum of £10 3s. 6d. for twelve days'
trouble in collecting it. Ryde contributed 20s. during
the previous week, and in several other towns the sums
varied from 5s. to 34s. the day. Cirencester is marked
down "Not charitable," no sum being entered opposite
the name. To other places where little cash was given
or to be expected, it was marked "No go;" and several
fourpenny beds were noted down as "small and
uncomfortable."

A case illustrative of the Tendencies of the Game
Laws came before the County Court at Holbeach,
Lincolnshire, on the 13th. A young fisherman, named
Gee, sued a Mr. Elliff, an opulent farmer, residing in
Holbeach Marsh, for £50, as compensation for injuries
sustained from being purposely shot by the defendant.
On the 7th of December, the plaintiff went upon some
land belonging to a Mr. Wooley, and killed a hare. He
was about going away from the spot, when he saw the
defendant (Mr. Elliff) in an adjoining field. Defendant
followed him, and on nearing him, he pointed a double-
barrelled gun close to Gee's head, and vowed he would
mark him. He kept walking up with the plaintiff,
when he suddenly lingered behind, and the plaintiff
distinctly heard a percussion-cap explode, and the
contents of one of the barrels lodged in the ground.
The plaintiff then addressed Elliff, and said, "Surely
you don't mean to shoot me in this lonely place?" He
replied, "I do mean to shoot you." After accompanying
him about a quarter of a mile, he stopped, and having
taken a deliberate aim, fired, and the shot of the
second barrel struck him in the right hand and arm,
inflicting serious wounds. The defendant then exclaimed,
"Now I can take you; I have marked you, so I shall
know you again, and I will go back and look for the
hare." The plaintiff then contrived to crawl on to
Holbeach, enduring the most excruciating agony, when
he was taken into custody for trespassing in pursuit of
game, and was committed to Spalding gaol for one
month. Mr. Wilkinson, a surgeon, attended the
wounded man in prison. There were from thirty to
forty shot wounds on his right arm and hand; and great
fears were entertained of lock-jaw setting in. The
injuries he had sustained had entirely prevented him
doing any work since. The Rev. Mr. Morton, a magistrate,
before whom the case was first brought, stated
that he asked defendant why he committed so rash an
act as to shoot Gee, when he replied that he had merely
done so to "mark him." The judge (Mr. J. D.
Burnaby) said, the act of the defendant in firing at Gee was
wholly unjustifiable. In calculating damages he did
not consider the loss of time for the month's imprisonment,
because plaintiff had rendered himself liable to
that by trespassing in pursuit of game, but considered
the acute pain endured in gaol, and the probable loss of
time to come; and he gave a verdict for plaintiff for
£38 and costs.

An action, at the instance of the Crown against the
London Dock Company, was decided in the Court of
Exchequer on the 18th, after a trial of eleven days'
duration. There were many charges of alleged evasion,
of duties, and fraudulent abstraction of goods to the
amount of many thousand pounds. The principal charge
was for having attempted to defraud the revenue of
duties on 250 cwt. of sugar and 8000 lbs. of cocoa. The
verdict of the jury, virtually negativing the charges,
was as follows: "We find for the Crown as regarding
the two boxes of Havannah sugar, and for the Dock
Company as regarding the remainder; also that there
was no intention to evade the duty." The verdict was
accompanied with a strong recommendation to the
Dock Company "to be stricter with regard to their
subordinate officers, as many irregularities had occurred
at the docks."

The notorious Captain Routledge, who was
committed to prison on the charge of Swindling Bill-
discounting Transactions, (see " Household Narrative"
for January, page 8), has died in gaol.

Mulcharey and O'Shea, Irishmen, have been
committed for trial by the Marlborough Street magistrate,
for having in their possession a steel mould for making
Spurious Half-crowns. They ordered the mould of
Mr. Sounes, a die-engraver of Rupert Street, and also
directed him to engrave copies of notes of the Bank of
Ireland. Mr. Sounes informed the police, and acted in
concert with them; and thus the culprits were captured
as they carried away the mould.

An action against the printer of the Times for a Libel
was tried before Lord Campbell, at the Guildhall, on
the 19th. The escape of Hackett, the burglar, from
the Model Prison, near Holloway, will be recollected.
Immediately after that occurrence, the daily newspapers
contained a biographical note of Hackett, describing his
numerous feats in escaping from prison: one of these
feats had been an escape from the lock-up of the
Marlborough Street police-court, and it was in the description
of this that the libellous passage occurred, as
follows:—"The authorities instituted an inquiry, and
it turned out that a turnkey had received a large sum
of money to effect his (Hackett' s) liberation; and he
was discharged." Wilks is the dismissed turnkey. He
now sought damages, both on account of the general
defamation, and on account of a specific refusal of
employment which he pretended had been caused by the
words just quoted. For the defence it was proved, that
the Government authorities did inquire into the conduct
of Wilks in relation to the escape, and did dismiss him
three days afterwards; but it was not proved that
Wilks received the money of corruption. It was also
proved that the refusal of employment, alleged as special
damage, occurred after the dismissal, and before the
appearance of the article in the Times. Lord Campbell
directed the jury, that as the truth of the libel was not
established, the verdict must be for the plaintiff; but
the damages might be moderate, for the discreditable
attempt to prove special injury had failed. The jury
gave the plaintiff a verdict for one farthing damages.

Mr. Francis Edmund Knowles, late Commissary-
General, committed suicide during the night of Sunday
the 16th, at the house of a relative in Grosvenor-square.
He was found dead in his bed on Monday morning,
having swallowed a large quantity of prussic acid. Mr.
Knowles had for some time suffered from low spirits,
and imagined he had an organic disease: he had been
advised to resign his office in consequence of his state of
health. He had lately lost a daughter, who was burned
to death; five or six years ago a son died in Sierra
Leone; another son had recently gone there: these
things preyed much on his mind. His despondency had
been particularly noted of late. Mr. Knowles's surgeon
stated to the coroner's jury that his patient had no
organic affection. The verdict was, "That the deceased
died from hydrocyanic acid, taken by himself while in a
state of insanity."

At Lancaster Assizes, on the 19th, Samuel Donaldson,
formerly actuary of the Ulverstone Savings Bank, was
tried for appropriating to his own use the money of the
depositors. There were two charges; one of having by
false pretences obtained large sums from the Lancaster
Banking Company, and the other of having got money
from the cashier of the savings bank on the false pretence
that depositors in the Ambleside branch bank wished to
withdraw their deposits. It appeared that Donaldson,
by means of false statements and fictitious accounts, had
been defrauding the savings bank from 1817 to 1849.
He was authorised to draw from the Lancaster Bank
the money required to make repayments to depositors
each week; and as he obtained this money without
stating to the bank for what purpose he wanted it, Mr.