The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1862-08-12 00:00:00

ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS.

FASHIONABLE c CRIMINAL

SHOP-LIFTING.—What comparison is there between
the guilt of the poor uneducated woman who ventures
in rags and misery to steal from the apparent super-
fluities of her neighbour a portion for her starving
family, and the crime of the well-fed, well-dressed,
fashionable lady who sails into the shop of the unwary
tradesman, and Betel:its articlea of useless luxury, care-
less to a degree as to whether her busba.nd can pay for
them or not? The sagged culprit is watched and driven
from the window the fashionable lady is welcomed in
complacently, and bowed Cut gratefully, with the assu-
rance that her esteemed orders shall be immediately
attended to. When the goods she has nominally pur-
chased are sentihome, and they, like their real owner,
are readily taken in, the grand piano is perhaps heard
' in her elegantly-furnished apartments, or the carriage
of some wealthy friend is standing at her door. The
lady's place in church and in society is gaily filled, and
for a certain or rather uncertain period the custom and
the company of "such a highly respectable family" are
considered an acquisition in the neighbourhood. But
"a change comes o'er the spirit of the dream." In course
..pf time the lady who ordered with the greatest ease is
discovered to pay with the greatest difficulty, and her
commands are not so much esteemed as formerly. The
dishonest beggar woman has managed to purloin an
article of about a shilling value; she is caught, con-
rioted, sent to prison, with the felon's mark upon her
abject wretchedness. Things have come, too, to a
crash with our fashionable friend; the lady'. husband
is simply declared "unfortunate," and if forced to
remove into an humbler dwelling in a district in which
she is net known, she is at liberty to pursue her former
practices of shop-lifting as far as circumstances will
allow! It is certainly not too much to assert that
every one of the article which have been thus crimi-
nally obtained, and the possession of which appeared
so indispensable to the vanity or the consequence of
those who longed for them, has in its turn helped to
lessen their consideration, and to expose Chain to
ridicule, it not contempt Whet, in fact, have the wetly
follies of our neighbours brought upon them ! and
whilst we see that, is it not moon-stricken madness to
imitate them. We see such a course of sonduct as that
of the fashionable lady lead to censure, ill-will, and
degradation, and we deliberately go in for censure, ill-
will, and ultimate degradation by imitating her. And
the shopkeeper who still remembers the shop-lifting
ease of the starving beggar woman, and feels her punish-
ment was scarcely commensurate with her crime, is, in
spite of past experience, still ready to welcome our first
approaches to his counter with the old complacency,
and to mare us that our esteemed orders shall be
immediately attended to • that is, if, as the lady in
question, we assume a fashionable tone, and know how
to cheat or rob fashionably.

GOOD SIMPER.
"Come father, son, and brother,
Now listen to my. say;
Come daughter, wife, and mother,
To it you'll not say nay."
No trait of character in domestic life is more com-
mendable than good temper. Home cab never be happy
without it. It is like the flowers that spring up in our
pathway, reviving and cheering us. Let a mango home
at night, wearied and worn by the toils of the day, and
how soothing is a word dictated by kindliness, good-
will, and frank disposition It is sunshine falling on
his heart. He is happy, and the cares of life are for-
gotten. Good temper in the father has a soothing
innuendo over the minds of • whole family. Where it
I. found in the wife and mother you observe a kindness
and love predominating over the natural feelings of a
bad disposition even, and making things bright. Where
it is distingaishable in brother and sister, pea oe end love
have their dwelling in that habitation; smiles, kind
I words, and looks, mutually exchanged at appropriate
periods between members of a family, gain= advantage
over the ills, and trials, and cares of life, and with such
the motto on their crests should be—" Victory."