The Express.
London, England, 1861-09-26 00:00:00

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T.. say that trot& is stranger than fiction is
not only as absurd as most commonplaces, but
si.jually unjust to fiction and to truth. Nothing
too strange can happen in a world where all is
imaginary and unreal—persona, situations, and
incidents. It is when the boundary line of fiction
is crossed by fact, and the plot of a novel is unra-
velled in a police-court, that truth seems "strange"
to a gaping public, not because it sounds like
fiction, but because facts of this kind are not
found out every day, and • make-be-
lieve world is easily surprised. There is
something providential in the supply of ex-
citements dunnl the dead season. The mur-
derous den in Northumberland-street was scarcely
wiped up, whin a shower of railway manslaughter,
set in ; and the Inquests are only just over when
" the Rugby Romance" appears on the scene. It
is a hard fate for that most respectable midland
town that its name should be coupled with •
" romance " destitute even of the tragic dignity of
crime. It is a still harder case that the names of
two estimable families should be dragged by the
unscrupulous carelessness that panders to unscru-
pulous curiosity, into connexion with a low
adventure made up of the meanest and moat
vulgar motives, the coarsest incidents, and the
foulest insinuations. Perhaps it is the disease of
a tedious and monotonous society, this mania for
dressing up and decorating with showy properties
and appointments a piece of stupid heartlessness
and fraud.

The amount of invention and exaggeration that
has been heaped upon this disgusting business
would make the fortune of many of those thrilling
penny tales which ladies' maids and footmen de-
vour in their idle hours. The facts of the case are
few and simple. Mr. Iticiisan GOINNZIIS Hitt,
who was yesterday committed for trial, is, it
seems, an Irish gentleman, who, some time before
August, 1852, made the acquaintance of Miss
Asiv tirOKUiAsA HURDIIIT, a young lady then
living with her widowed mother, won
her affections, and obtained her hand.
So far there is nothing beyond the range of very
ordinary experience. Given the "gentleman," as
he might be described in a passport, and the young
lady under the can of her mother, pretty, and
said to be rich, and with neither father nor brother
to protect her, and what follows is quite in the
order of nature. Irish gentlemen of no particular
calling, with no professional demands upon their
leisure, with lively imaginations and inquiring
minds, are naturally attracted by young ladies
with undefined expectations. Mr. RIVHAILLI
Ilonrrnss HILL in due course wee married to Mies
AMY 0110110ILNA BeIIDITT at the British Embassy,
Brawls. Before the marriage (for in this case
the " romance " comes afterwards) the fortune of
the bride-5,0001. in possession (and 9,0001. in
reversion on the death of her mother)—was settled
so as to give the husband a life interest, reserving
1001. • year to the wife as pin-money ; and
failing Mine, with power to the wife to appoint by
will. For six years and a half Mr. and Mrs.
Ilrtt lived together, childless. l 1859, at
Dublin, Mrs. fliu became in the family-way, and
it appears her husband was particularly anxious
that the child ahoold be born in London. But at
Rugby Mrs. 11 st.x wee obliged to stop, and there,
in the nearest homes to the station, in a small inn,
the child was born ; and at Rugby, according to law,
the child was registered by the father, but ree-
ntered as the sou of Rouse and MART HILL;
" maiden name of mother, Smote ; profession
"of father, general merchant." For ten days the
child was nursed by its mother. It then occurred
to the father that the baby would do better out at
nurse, and the mother consented to send her first-
born infant, under the charge of a girl of 14, to
London. From that day till the present nothing
more was heard of the child. The mother it is
natural to suppose inquired after it from time to
time, and was satisfied to be told that it was doing
well. At length, however, she became impatient
to see tb• child, and was told on one omission that
it was dead ; on another, that it had been sent to
Australia. It was reasonable that the mother should
be anxious, and even MILOS to live any longer!
with her husband unless the child was restored to
bor. Inquiries were met on foot ; Cie services of
the detective police were engaged, and the two
women who had received the child at Euston
Station two years before from the bands of the
father and the little girl were traced the
one to a horrible den in St. Odes's, the other
to the Roane of Correction. These women wore
able to identify the gentleman who had given on. I
Of them the child to keep ; and they were both
identified by the girl who brought the child to li
London. The shawl in which the child was
wrapped when she received it was still in the'
woman's possession, and was produced. So far
the evidence was singularly complete. The birth
of the child at Rugby was proved by the nurse
and the surgeon. The entry in the register was
produced, the girl who brought the infant to Lon-
don, the women who received it—all and each
contributed their several links to the evidence.
(inc of these women swore that she bad never
lost sight of the child during two years, exce;:t
for one week, when she was in prison and the
child was sent into the workhouse. The
child itself bore witness, at least by visible
repulsion, to its foster-mother. Enough
of obscurity and uncertainty, however, still hangs
about certain points of the evidence to exercise the
skill and quickness of an ingenious counsel. The
child is there, but the mother cannot swear to its