The Sun.
London, England, 1839-04-12 00:00:00

EVENING EDITION.

that of ascerlaining, except in this instance, the pro-
portun of offences to convictions. The answers
from the county -magistrates, gaolers, and others,
were most unsatisfactory. The ordinary tenor of the
greater proportion of answers was, "a few"—" we
cannot ascertain." " There may be persons of this
description, but we have no means of. ascertaining
their number. " In order to form some criterion,
therefore, as to the proportion of persons who live
by habitual depredation, the Commissioners had
recourse to the following plan :

With a view to make some approximation to a tolera-
bly correct estimate of the amount of crime actually com-
mitted, as compared with the prosecutions within particular
districts, we have directed an enumeration to to made by
the Metropolitan Police, of the number and description of
persons known to them as being addicted to habitual della;
quency or breaches of the law. We have obtained similar
enumerations from •Liverpool, Bristol, Bath, Hull, and
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, where the police is organized and
conducted on the sante plan ER the Metropolitan Police.
Before the means of tnals,ng such estimates were obtained
by the organization of such an agency mere or less closely
observant of the-classes in question, and therefore enabled
to give more or less accurate particulars with relation to
them, one of the Commissioners who had then paid atten-
tion to the subject, endeavoured to determine the number
of common thieves who were at large in the metropolis.
The course taken was to endeavour to ascertain the follow-
ing points : —First, the average duration of the career of
corn own thieves or habitual depredators before their perma-
nert removal from the field of depredation, by tranapere-
tion, death, or other means. Secondly, the number of be.
bitual depredators who annually pass through the gnols,
and are permanently removed from the field of depredation
by such means. Upon the first of those points, it was esti-
mated in 1830, on the information of governors of prisons, at-
torneys practising in criminal courts, and other persons con-
versant with the habits of the criminal population in the me-
tropolis, that the average career of impun'tj to common
thicvn was not less than six years. On the second point
it was estimated that the total number of habitual depre-
dators annually tried in the Crown Courts of the metro-
polis, was in round numbers 1,000: hence. it followed
that the number of common thieves at large in the metro-
polis, from which the auntie.' supply of 1,000 convicts was
made without apparent diminution, could not be less than
6,000. Ia the year 1834 an estimate -was made of the
number of common thieves in the metropolis known to the
Metropolitan Police. The total number then known to
them was 5,210. Upon a more close enumeration made
in the year 1837, the numler was returned as 6,407.

The following is the proportion of known bad cha-
racters to the population of the six large towns to which
they extended their inquiry:—London Metropo-
litan Police District, 1 In 8!) ; Liverpool, 1 in 45 ;
Bristol, 1 in 31 ; Bath, 1 in 37 ; 1 in 64 ;
and Newcastle-on-Tyne, 1 in 27 ; but this list in-
cludes three classes :

I. Persons Rho have no visible means of subsistence,
and who arc believed to live wholly by violatiou of the law,
as by habitual depredation, by fraud, by prostitution, &c.
11. Persons following some ostensible and legal occupa-
tion, but who are known to have committed an armee, and
are believed to augment their gains by habitual or ceca-
sional violation of the law. 111. Persons not known to
have committed any offences, but known as associates of
the above cla;scs, and otherwise deemed to be suspicious
characters.

The number of common thieves in the metropolis
was estimated not long ago at 30,000, and, ac-
cording to Mr. Colquhoun, the Magistrate of the
Thames Police, the number of depredators and
prostitutes amounted in his time to 50,000, an
estimate proved to be enormously extravagant. In
a recent address published by a voluntary associa-
tion for the suppression of prostitution, the num-
ber of persons of that description in the metropolis
was stated to be not less than 80;000, while " the
actual enumeration shows that at this time the
number living amidst nearly a million and a half of
the population does not exceed 7,000.

The next point of inquiry was the proportion of
vagrant thieves who constitute the most prominent
body of delinquents in the rural districtsthose
who seek alms as mendicants, and those who travel
from town to town and from fair to fair, and who
make incursions from the provincial towns upon the
adjacent rural districts. From persons of this class
confessions were obtained setting forth in detail
their previous career of depredation, and the
description of their associates. The following
extract is from a statement made by a prisoner
in Salford Gaol, aged 21, the son of honest parents
at Manchester. The gypsies come in for their
share of the blame, and the unfortunate Irish are
not forgotten. Even this scamp traces the source
of his crimes to Irish blood:

. For the last four years, up to 1839, I have " travelled"
fur a maintenance. I carried a covered hawker's basket
with an oil-case on the top, with cutleryorinkets, braces,
Birmingham fancy goods, buttons, pearl, bone, and wood.
This pack was net what I and others chiefly depended on;
it was the excuse for travelling ; and also something to fall
back upon in case we could do no business of other kinds.
The value of the contents would vary from 21. to 41. I have
sold silk goods " stolen," bought of the shop-lifters ; dare
are these in all towns, small as well as large. They will
r. not sell to any unless they know them ; if they supposed a
man to be "a traveller," they would come up-to him and
say, perhaps Will you stand for some handkerchiefs,
ribbon, anything in gold, or silver, or wearing apparel ?"
There are ring. stealers, on pretence of bUying them. Nee.
d4e-stealers from drapers' shops " buy 100, and steal a
couple of thousand." There arc cant words for everything
you use or do. I have seen some old cant in print, but it
is nothing to the cant now used. There are three sorts of
cant, the gipsies', the beggars' (such as pretended sailors
and others), and the thieves'. . The cants are distinct in
many words, but alike in others. A stranger to the cant
words could not understand the gipsies or others, save a
few words here and there. The gipsies have a cant word
for every word they speak. The vagrant cant is a lower
style than the thieves ; they use it to tell one another whit
they get at different houses ; they are not always thieves,
they will not push themselves 'forward to steal, and one.-
half of them, if they saw another stealing, would tell of
him, and yct, if they could do it themselves they would.
The gipsies arc the worst of thieves ; they live by fortune-
telling; they make rings out of brass buttons and pewter,
and the wives sell them as gold and silver; they have files
end other implements for cutting them out; the metal
ones ate cast ; many of them make bad money. They will
coin the money in lanes, or buy it of the dealers in towns in
the rough, and make it up themselves. This is extensively
done, most " up" the country, the south and west of England;
more round Sussex, Essex, Kent, Surrey, Northampton.
They have no religion; are heavy curaers; go in fa-
milies ; never marry ; many of them arc sheep-steelers.
The two families of the Boslems and Smiths, about sixty
in each, arc about Nottinghatnabire and, De: bysh!re ; hardly
an Assize or Sessions but some of this set are had up ; in
a inter they live is towns, if very severe. They will he in
one tent when out ; as soon as old enough they " pair,",
and if they don't like each other, after a fight the woman
will go to her own tribe again, and the man selocts ano-
ther woman. Play cards and drink the Sundays. " Tra-
vellers" will not "do business" on Sundays. There are
come who will rob houses at chapel-time On that day, be_
cause they canrot get in at others. I kt.ow two sent front
Leicester last March for a robbery on Sunday night. One
got fifteen, the other ten years. Amongst thievee there are
several kinds. Ist. Those confined to pit:kilt pockets
have boys to work for them, and close round them, that to
one shall see them. This is very gainful large towns
furnish furnish them, and they frequent all fairs, wakes, and races.
They travel various ways, some with spring and covered
carts. " Muffling" the cart is of use only when there is
no watchman ; the wheels and horses' feet are all clothed.
I have net heard of its being done this long time. 2.1.
Robbers of the person with violence, mostly three toge-
ther, two will hold the man, and the third rifle his pockets.
All three will, perhaps, be behind when the attack is made,
and one will put his arms round him, or he would hit hint
from behind with a s!one in a handkerchief, or a heavy
stick, to stun or " drop" him, and when the plunder is
got, throw him out of the way. If a man is in a gig, one
will get behind, and get his arms round him and drag him
out, or one will hold the horse and cut the- reins. A horse-
man will do well to take to the fields, but in a gig a man
has only the chance of self-defence ; few " travellers" i. e.
.Ilieves, will venture their lives if a pistol is shown. Few

" travellers" are confined to one kind of robbing ; in
some places you will see the same persons with boys pick-
ing pockets, and others with a threc-thimble tale, gam
Wing at fairs and races; it would 13, a good thing to stop
it universally ; they are thieves to a man ; it would draw
them to other things.

Take one with another, Manchester is the worst town in
England for a thief; I have beard the names of - and
the other side of London. Liverpool is a bettor place
for a thief than Manchester, if he be a stranger. If yOO
say in any other part of England that you are from Man-
chester, von are Et once supposed to be a thief; it is the
same with London, Birmingham, and Liverpool; but they
say that Manchester and Birmingbamturn out more thieves
than London and Liverpool. The Manchester end Liver,
pool are reckoned the most expert. Obey are thought to be
of Irish parents, and to have most funning. la fact, I'll be
bound to say, that three parts of those who 4re travelling
now throughout the kingdom have Irish bloodtilt them, el.
thcr from father, mother, or grandmother.
I should think' there are some thousands of " travellers"
in England, not to mention Ireland and Seotiand ; there
arc more in Scotland than Ireland (Ireland is too poor,
unless in the large towns). I have seen 150 cf
vas at one place.

There have been 27,730 committals in the seve-
ral counties of Ireland for the year 1838, and 11,036
cons ictions.
and decayed
oawgsedhas met with a
WATERMEN'S CHARITY.—The new Institu-
etnh the
nedrei
gtihotne
rmo feiialarnn
dshtohuesiers%fv?r ‘
tni•canterfontr
from the commercial and chipping
support interests of the
trade and port of London exceeding the 'most sanguine ex-
pectations of the Wa.erman's Company, by whom this be-
nevolent scheme Was founded. The subscriptions in ten
weeks amount to 5,0001., in addition to a site for the alias.
homes at Sydenham, presented by Mr. J. D. Brown, gra-
nary-keeper. The Royal Exchange Assurance Company
have recently given 100 guineas to the institution, and
other corm-net calbodies, merchants, and bankers have sub-
scribed most liberally: The sum required to build and
endow the almshouses for 100 watermen and lightcrinen,
and their iv idows is 20,0001., and there is no doubt tht.
whole amount will shortly be collected. _