The Sun.
London, England, 1830-01-05 00:00:00

BOW-STREET.

Yesterday John Stephenson, landlord of the Three
Lances at Hounslow, was brought in custody before
Sir R. BIRNIE and Mr. MINSIIULL, charged with
having attempted to murder his wife.
Jane Stephenson was wife to the prisoner, and
had been married to him for the last two years. On
Sunday last, about one o'clock, he seized her by the
neck and drove her against the wall, and whilst he
held her back with his left hand, he made a despe-
rate stab at her stomach with a carving-knife which
he held in his right hand. Most fortunately the
point of the knife struck against the steel busk of
her stays; and such was the violence of the blow,
that the blade snapped short near the handle and
bounded against the ceiling. The prisoner, sup-
posing he had killed her, ran out of the house with
the handle of the knife in his hand, and meeting a
neighbour, he told him what he had done, adding,
" I think I have finished her; go and see." The
prisoner then ran towards a pond, and threw the
handle of the knife upon the ice, where it was after-
wards found. The complainant added, that the
prisoner was at the time almost mad from the effects
of drink; and in answer to questions put to her by
the Magistrate, she stated that she had five children
by a former husband, and that she had known the
prisoner for 20 years, he having been in the habit of
stopping at the house during her first husband's life-
time, when he was employed as a traveller for a
commercial house in town.

Sir R. BituitE asked the prisoner what he had to
say in his defence.
The prisoner knew he had done wrong, and was
sorry for it. He admitted that he had no reason to
be angry with his wife, and said he had had a dispute
with some person just before he committed the as-
sault upon her; added to which, he was not quite
himself, having drunk four pints of beer. _ _

Sir R. BIRNIE said, that the assault was of such
a desperate description, that the prisoner must re-
main in custody until he could procure good bail,
and he must give 24 hours' notice of the same.
The prisoner was then removed in custody.
LAMBETH-STREET.

A woman applied for a summons to the parish of
St. George. She said her husband was in the
Guards, and al present stationed in the Tower. He
could not support her, and she had made application
to the parish, and they refused to relieve her.
Mr. WALKER said parishes would be in a pretty
state, if every soldier's wife were to come to the
parish. He would, however, grant her a summons.
An Irishwoman also applied for a summons. She
said the parish would give her no relief ; her husband
was ill, and she had no means of support.
Mr. WALKER was sure that the applicant kept
something back, and asked her if she had not re.
fused to be passed to Ireland.
The applicant admitted that she had refused to
be passed.

Mr. WALKER would grant her a summons, and
have the case investigated.
A man and his wife and one child applied for
relief from the parish of Mile-end Old-town.
The man stated that he had no work, and that
his wife expected to be put to bed every day.
Mr. WALKER told him he must make application
to his own parish of Shoreditch.
A man applied for relief from the same parish.
Allen, the beadle, said that the parish the appli-
cant belonged to was Woolwich. He had been
bound apprentice, but in rather an irregular manner,
from Chiselhurst to Woolwich. The man had a
wife, aged twenty-four, and a child at present ill of
the small pox.
Mr. WALKER did not consider this a cue at all
for the interference of the parish, a young man of
25 and a woman of 24 were not fit objects for relief.
He thought the better way:would be to give the ap-
' plicant some casual relief and make him provide for
himself.

Allen, the bead* agreed to do We. He said

that the distress in the parish in consequence of the
severe ►weather was very great.
Mr. WALKER said the distress might be great
among persons who had large families, but i I such
persons as the last applicant were to be taken into
the house, it would bring distress upon the parish as
well as upon individuals.
Yesterday a charge of assault was preferrgd be-
fore T. WALKER, Esq., by a sleek, greasy eatimg-
house-keeper, against a thickset, hungry-looking
mechanic.

" Please your.Vorship," began the complainant,
" I sells cook'd wittles, and this ere chap corned on
Saturday to my shop, and said, he was werry peckish,
and should like summut nice. ' Vot can you have
nicer,' sis I, nor a hot savoloir and a baked tator ?'
Vell,' sis he, I'll have a hot savoloir with some
mutton gravy.' So, as I was a dipping into the
pot for von, I seed him prigging a bit of roast weal.
Cup,' sis I, ' that's no go,' and I axed him to
chop a bob for the weal, vhen he said he had not
got a map; more nor twopence to pay for the savo-
loirs. Then I jumps over the counter, and ketches
the weal out of his fist, and claps it back again into
the dish. Arterwards I werry gently showed him
out of the shop; and, while my back was turned,
he fetched me such a nasty kick behind that I went
smack into a sarsepan of hot weggetables."—
(Laughter.)
The defendant, when called upon to explain the
aforesaid kick, declared that the defendant. had not
only commenced the assault, but had used violent
language.
" That ere's false," said the complainant, " for
I'm always werry portickeler never to give no body
not no sauce."

The Magistrate, considering the assault proved,
fined the defendant Is. and discharged him.

M ATTON-GARDEN.

The efficiency of the New Police system, in the
attainment of the great object for which it has been
constructed, the prevention of crime, is evinced in a
very striking manner within the district of this office.
Comparatively speaking, yesterday was a day of rest
for the Magistrates here,—a circumstance which,
under the old system, perhaps has never occurred.
Watch-houses have been generally filled dining the
course of Saturday night wig Sunday with persons,
both male and female, charged under every denomi-
nation of crime, and on the following Monday the
police-office has been crammed with them almost to
suffocation, the necessary consequence of which was
that the prisons too were densely crowded. Pre-
vious to the re-modelling, in its present state, of
the police, we recollect that scarcely a week, or even
two nights consecutively, passed that some house in
the district was not broken into and plundered, or some
respectable individual knocked down in the street
and robbed. At present, and ever since September
last, either of these circumstances is of rare occur-
rence indeed. From all the quarters of a very ex-
tensive district, the police station in Red Lion-
square, whither all persons charged are brought,
did not yesterday morning contain more than half-
a-dozen individuals, who were locked up merely for
being disorderly.