The Sun.
London, England, 1849-12-29 00:00:00

GUILDHALL.

In the course of the morning Sir Peter Laurie
entered the justice-room, and begged the sitting
magistrate to allow him to express his thanks to
the press for the kindness with which it bad assisted
him in tracing a poor man who was missing, and
was supposed to be drowned. The notice taken by
the press had elicited that the man was alive.
He had written to his brother, Mr. Petrie, of Dun-
dee, from Kent, and had removed the anxiety for his
fate which had arisen in his family. He (Sir P.
Laurie's) correspondent wrote, " I know not all you
have done in regard to the matter, but your giving
publicity to my letter has been the means, under
God, of meeting the eye of the object sought for.
Accept, then, of my tribute of thanks for your great
kindness in answering the prayer of an entire
stranger."

MARLBOROUGH-STREET.
Thomas Eagles, town-traveller to Mr. J. Rogers,
.obacconist, 392, Oxford-street, was charged with
having embezzled various sums of money belonging
to his employer.
The prisoner was fully committed.
W ORSHIP-STRE ET.
Sarah Jane Smith was charged with robbing her
landlady, Mrs. Anne Binkes, the wife of a mechanic
at Cambridge-heath.
The prosecutrix stated that the prisoner had occu-
pied furnished apartments in her house for a consi-
derable time past, and always paid her rent with ex-
treme regularity until about a week ago, when she,
fell a fortnight in arrear, and witness being in want
of the money, 11s., pressed her for payment. On the
following Monday (last Monday) she paid her the
amount, but witness having received a private intimation
that she had most probably been paid out of the produce
of some portion of her own goods, she went up to the
prisoner's apartment, and intimated her suspicions,
upon which the prisoner at once admitted the fact,
intreated her forgiveness, and promised, if she would
afford her time to do so, to return all her property in
a week or two. Upon examining the place, however,
she found that not only had the sheets, blankets, pil-
lows, and other articles disappeared, but that even the
bed itself bad been taken, and as the value of the
whole was about 51., and she could not afford the
loss, she immediately called in a policeman, and gave
the prisoner into custody.
The prisoner burst into tears, and stated that she
was the daughter :of a licensed victualler, who had
formerly been in very affluent circumstances, but had,
through a series of misfortunes, been deprived of his
business, and was now reduced to such distress, with
a large family to provide for, that he could only
allow her (the prisoner) half-a-crown per week for
her support. She was a very good needlewoman,
and therefore had recourse to that for a subsistence,
and was for some time so successful that she was not
only enabled to employ a number of other needle-
women under her, but also to respectably furnish
a small house out of her earnings, and for some
time was doing exceedingly well, when all of a sudden
the work fell off, and then declined so rapidly that
she was obliged to discharge all her hands, not having
work enough for herself, and ultimately lost the whole
of her furniture also. She then took the prosecu-
trix's lodgings, and after working hard for many
weeks at needlework which produced her only half-
a-crown to 3s. per week, and pawning all her wearing
apparel and other articles to the value of 201., to pro-
cure food and pay the prosecutrix her rent, amount-
ing to 4s. per week, she had no longer anything to
raise money upon, and to save herself from starvation,
and pay Mrs. Binkes the 1 ls. she pressed her for, she
was tempted to make temporary use of the prosecu-
trix's goods, without considering she was committing
a crime, as she paid for the hire of them, and with
the full intention of restoring them, unknown to her,
as soon as she could again get employment, which
she was promised in a fortnight by two houses in the
City, for whom she had long worked, but whom she
had daily called upon for some time past without
avail. In proof of her assertion the prisoner exhibited
to the magistrate her fingers, which appeared to be
literally seamed with needlemarks, and offered, if the
prosecutrix would give her time, to place in her hands
as security duplicates for property to ten times the
amount she was sued for—ll. 155., and appealed to
the pawnbroker then in attendance, whether he had
not goods of hers in his possession one to the amount
of at least 201.

The pawnbroker answered that he had no doubt he
had, and also stated that the prisoner had always
appeared to him to be a very respectable and well-
conducted young woman.
In answer to the magistrate's questions, the pro-
secutrix admitted that the prisoner's conduct, whilst
in her house, had been of the most unexceptionable
character; she was constantly engaged at needle.
work the whole of the day, till lately, when she
seemed to have nothing to do, and she knew that her
connexions were very respectable. She, however,
pressed the charge with much severity against her,
though repeatedly appealed to by the prisoner not to
send her to prison, which would be her ruin ; and the
prisoner having stated that she had no friend in town
but her father, who had been running about all day
like a madman, on hearing of her being in custody,
to endeavour to raise the money,
Mr. HAMMILL said that as the prisoner was ad-
mitted by the prosecutrix to have previously borne an
excellent character, and had conducted herself in the
most straightforward manner when accused of the
offence, and it must inevitably ruin her reputation if
she were committed to gaol, he would advise her to
accept the security the prisoner had offered, and
allow her the time she sought for the restoration of
her property, which she certainly would not procure
if the prisoner were committed. The prisoner was
perfectly unjustified in the course she had pursued,
but it was hard to say what a woman might do in a
state of starvation, and he thought the fortnight ought
to be allowed her, but he must at the same time tell
the prisoner that she would certainly be committed at
the expiration of that period if the prosecutrix were
not then satisfied.

The prosecutrix, but with great reluctance, ulti-
mately acceded to this arrangement, and the prisoner
was in the meantime liberated upon a 201. recog-
niz mice.