University of Virginia Library

9. CHAP. IX.

The morning succeeding the attempt to rob and
murder me, I inquired my way to the police-office,
which I finally discovered at a cobbler's stall, in
one of the filthiest streets of the whole city, called
Pattypan-lane. I found his worship sitting on his
bench, in a leather apron, most sedulously occupied
in mending an old boot. On my informing
him I had business, he looked down at my feet,
very earnestly—“Hum! why your boots don't
seem to want mending—but let us see.” So he
seized hold of my boot, and laid me sprawling on
the floor, in attempting to pull it off. He then fell

into a passion with my boots, and swore the fellow
that made them so tight ought to be “dirked,”
the usual phrase for the punishment of slight offences
among these humane republicans.

It was with some difficulty I made him understand
my business was not with the cobbler, but
the magistrate. “Well, go on with your information,”
replied he, “while I finish my job; I can
take a stitch while you tell your story.” So he
fell to work lustily, while I proceeded to detail
the events of the last night. When I had done,
he looked at me for a moment, and then with the
true gravity and demeanour of a genuine republican
magistrate, burst into a horse laugh, and took
into his mouth a huge quid of tobacco. “And you
are positive their intention was to rob and murder
you?” quoth the sage Minos. I offered to swear
to it, upon which he handed the book, and administered
the oath. “Very well, we must send
for these bloody-minded villains, and see what
they have to say for themselves. A little Frenchman,
with a mahogany face, gold ear-rings, and
dimity breeches, say you? we must describe the
villain, as you don't know his name.” On receiving
satisfaction as to this point, he procured a warrant,
which he signed with his cross, being unable
to write his name; desired me to witness his
mark; and sent off one of his apprentices to bring
the offenders.

In a few minutes he returned with the little
Frenchman, his companion, and almost all the lodgers

at the city-hotel, landlord, waiters, and all.
His worship laid down his awl, and the examination
began.

“What is your name?”

“Pierre François Louis Maximilian Joseph
Maria Gourgac d'Espagnac de Gomperville,” answered
the little bandit.

“A whole band of robbers, in the person of one
little Frenchman,” observed his worship, turning
to his clerk, and directing him to write it down.
The clerk demurred to this, as to write it was quite
impossible.

“Well, then,” said his worship, “write down
Hard name, and proceed. Whence came you,
where are you going, what is your business, and
how came you to put this gentleman in bodily fear
last night?”

“I came,” replied the bandit, “from New-Orleans,
which, as Monsieur knows (making me
a low bow) is not far from Portsmouth, in Alabama.
I am going to Charleston, to which place I
hope to have the pleasure of Monsieur's company,
(making me another low bow;) my business, it
seems, is principally to rob and murder Monsieur,
(another bow,) and I came to put him in bodily
fear, by reason of sharpening my razors at night,
which I generally do before I shave myself;”
making me another low bow, and offering his box.

“Hum!” quoth his worship, eying the little
Frenchman's stiff black beard, “A man with such
a brush under his nose might reasonably strap his

razors over night, I should think, without being
suspected of any other intent but to cut up his own
stubble field. But what other proofs have you of
this intent to rob and murder, hey?”

“My own conviction,” answered I.

“Aye! but a man's conviction is no proof of
guilt, except it be a conviction by judge and jury,”
answered the learned justice.

“The word of a gentleman!”

“Pooh! the word of a gentleman is no better
than the word of any other man. Every man is a
gentleman in this free country,” replied the democratic
Solon.

“Did they break into your room?”

“No—but they tried the lock.”

“Did they actually offer you any violence, or
attempt to cut your throat?”

“No—but the little Frenchman sharpened his
razors at me.”

“Have you any witnesses to prove the attempt?”

“The circumstances are, of themselves, sufficient—besides,
they have followed me all the way
from Portsmouth, and this is not the first time the
little Frenchman, and his accomplices, have made
the attempt.”

“Followed you!” quoth Solon; “travelling in
the same stages and steam-boats, and putting up at
the same houses, is what generally happens to people
travelling the same route—this is no proof of
wicked intention.”

The little Frenchman now appealed to the crowd
of city-hotel people, who, beyond doubt, were all
his accomplices, and who all testified that he had
been there two days before I made my appearance,
which the stupid cobbler-justice observed was
proof that he had not followed me, at the same
time hinting to the Frenchman, he had good
grounds for an information against me for following
him! Finding they were all in league together,
I determined to overwhelm the justice, the clerk,
the witnesses, and the culprits, by one single irresistible
testimony. I took from my pocket the fifty-eighth
number of the Quarterly, which I always
carry about me; and turning to page three-hundred
and fifty,seven, read in an audible voice as
follows:[1]

“Mr. Chichester told him,” (Mr. Faux,) “that
ten dollars would procure the life and blood of
any man in this country.” Mr. Chichester also
told me, that “he knew a party of whites who,
last year, roasted to death before a large log fire
one of their friends, because he refused to drink.”[2]

“And who is Mr. Chichester?” said the ignoramus,
who, it is plain, never reads the Quarterly.

“Mr. Chichester is a polished, gay, interesting
gentleman, travelling in his own carriage from
Kentucky to Virginia,” replied I, reading in the
Quarterly.[3] Again, sir, “Judge Waggoner, who

is a notorious hog-stealer, was recently accused,
while sitting on the bench, by Major Hooker, the
hunter, gouger, whipper, and nose-biter, of stealing
many hogs, and being, although a judge, the
greatest rogue in the United States.”[4] Again, sir,
we read from this same unquestionable authority,
“Doctor Thornton,[5] of the post-office, observed
to him that this city, like that of ancient Rome,
was peopled with thieves and assassins, and that
during his residence in it, he had found more villains
than he had seen in all the world besides.”

“And pray who is Doctor Thornton—is he in
court?” cried this pious minister of justice.

“Doctor Thornton,” replied I, “is a gentleman
of character and learning—he has invented a new
alphabet.”

“Diable!” interrupted the little Frenchman—
“'tis not the only thing he has invented I believe.”

I continued without noticing the interruption—
Dr. Thornton, sir, is an Englishman, and that is
a sufficient warrant for all he says. I know, however,
from the best authority, that by his eloquence
he prevented the gallant Cockburn from burning
the capitol and president's house during the late
war.”

“Diable!” again interrupted the little Frenchman,
“am I to be convicted of murder upon the
testimony of the goose whose cackling saved the
capitol?”

“But what do you intend by all this?” replied
his worship petulantly, and casting a wishful eye
at his old boot, as if he wanted to be stitching again.

“I mean, sir,” replied I solemnly, “to prove
by this testimony, that as ten dollars is the price
of blood in this country, that as Judge Waggoner is
a notorious hog-stealer, and that, as Doctor Thornton
affirms, four cities are peopled by thieves and
robbers, that in such a country, and among such a
people, the mere sharpening of a razor at such an
unreasonable hour, is sufficient presumptive proof,
to hang half a dozen Frenchmen and democrats.”

But the little Frenchman, who had by this time
sent and suborned the president of a bank, and two
or three directors, his accomplices no doubt, offered
their testimony to prove that he was a person
well known to them, of ample means and unblemished
character, equally above the temptation as
the suspicion of robbery or murder. Upon this,
in spite of my own testimony, and the authority
of the Quarterly, the precious cobbling justice dismissed
my complaint, and apprized the little
Frenchman that he might recover damages of me
if he chose. But the little bandit had other objects
in view, and after receiving the congratulations of
all present, (for these people adore the French only
because they take a little pains to be agreeable,)
turned to me with a most diabolical smile, made
me a low bow, offered his box, earnestly hoped he
should have the pleasure of my agreeable company
to Charleston, and assured me, upon his honour,

he would never attempt to cut my throat again
since he was born.

From this specimen of the mode of administering
republican justice, and the character of the
judges, who are, for the most part, pig-stealers, and
never read the Quarterly, one may judge of the
chance an Englishman has of protection or redress.
Every body is in league against him; it is sufficient
for a man only to be accused of doing wrong, in
order to excite the universal sympathy in his favour.
The officers of the courts, the magistrates,
judges, lawyers, and spectators, all have a fellow-feeling
for a criminal, having all been, or expecting
soon to be in a similar predicament, and the
accuser is thrice lucky, if he does not change places
with the accused. The lawyers, who are most expert
in snatching murderers from the gallows, are
certain to be made magistrates, and the most dexterous
pig-stealer is predestined to be a judge of
pig-stealers. The sheriff, not long since, was
obliged to hang his own nephew for the murder
of his mother, who was the sheriff's sister, as these
virtuous self-governing republicans thought it a
pity to hang a man for such a trifle, and not one
of them would tie the knot! The moral air is putrid,
and even the most honest Englishman cannot
breathe it without his principles being tainted with
the plague of democracy. Feeling this to be actually
the case with myself, I determined to change
the air as soon as possible, and not caring to go
back again to the hotel, to meet the banditti, and

their accomplices, I desired my old landlord, the
gentleman of colour, to go and pay for my lodgings,
and bring my portmanteau down to the
steam-boat, just then departing for the south.
I embarked in her, shaking the dust off my feet, as
I left this city of abominations, in which though
I had staid but two days, I had seen more of the
turbulent spirit of democracy than in all the world
beside. No wonder, seeing “it is peopled by
thieves and robbers;” and the Quarterly affirms
it to be the place where the “scum of all the
earth”[6] is collected.