The Sun.
London, England, 1844-11-14 00:00:00

WORK HOUSE REGULATIONS.

At the last meeting. of the bench of magistrates at
Kingston, seven young men were charged with mis-
behaviour in the Kingston workhouse, and refusing
to perform the work allotted to them, according to
the regulations of the establishment, as casual paupers.
It appeared that on the previous day the defendants
went in a body to the house of the relieving-officer,
and stated they were destitute, and demanded relief,
upon which he gave them an order of admission to
the workhouse. They were there required, before
any food was given to them, to break a certain num-
ber of stones, which they one and all positively re-
fused to do, upon which they were turned out of the
house, without any kind of food or refreshment being
given to them. They then, it appeared, went back to
the house of the relieving-officer, and again demanded
relief, and they were instantly taken into custody,
and conveyed by the police before Mr. Row, the
Mayor of Kingston. They there excused themselves
by saying that they were faint and weak and wanted
food, and they did not think that the people at the
workhouse had any right to set them to work
before they gave them food. The mayor recom-
mended that the men should be admitted into
the workhouse, and that food and shelter
should be given them for the night, upon the under-
standing that they should do double the allowance of
work the next morning. This was accordingly done,
but in the morning the men again refused to work,
and they were in consequence given into custody a
second time, and brought before Captain Roberts and
Mr. Williams, the presiding magistrates at the county
bench. The defendants conducted themselves in a
very impudent manner, and insisted that they had a
right to have food, and that nobody had a right to
compel them to work in the workhouse.
The MAGISTRATES said that there appeared to be a
determination among persons of the defendants' class
to set the workhouse rules at defiance, but they might
rely upon it they would find the law too strong for them.
They were then sentenced to fourteen days' impri-
sonment in the House of Correction. The defendants
were then removed, laughing at the proposed punish-
ment, and declaring that they should be as well off in
gaol as in the union workhouse.

FIRE AT CROYDON.-A fire took place at Croydon
on Tuesday night, on the premises of Mr. Harris, a
tailor and outfitter, residing in the High-street, which
but for its timely discovery might have been at-
tended by the loss of the lives of the whole of the in-
mates, consisting of Mr. Harris, his wife, and a female
servant, who, as it was, were only enabled to make
their escape, almost in a state of nudity, by means of a
ladder placed against their bed-room windows. It ap.
pears that between eleven and twelve o'clock a neigh-
bour's servant was passing the house, when she heard a
sound like the crackling of fire in the shop, and she im-
mediately gave an alarm, when it was discovered that
the shop was all in flames. Every endeavour was then
made for upwards of ten minutes, by knocking at the
door and various other means, to awaken the inmates of
the house, but without effect. The fire was in the mean-
time rapidly increasing, and at length a ladder was pro-
cured and placed up to the window, and a young man
named Chandler, who is in the service of a butcher in
the town, ascended, and forced his way into the room,
and actually awakened the inmates, who were at this
time still asleep, and unconscious of danger. All means
of egress by the lower part of the house was at this time
completely cut off, and Mr. llarris, his wife, and the
servant, were compelled to descend the ladder, which they
did without any injury, and then took refuge in the house
of a neighbour. The police, and a good many other
persons, had arrived by this time, and there being a
plentiful supply of water, the ravages of the fire were
confined to the shop and the lower part of the premises,
which, however, with a good deal of stock, were almost
entirely. destroyed. The property is insured in one of
the London fire-offices.

DREADFUL EFFECT OF FRIGIIT.—Some two OT
three weeks ago, a young woman, whose name we
do not give, went to the house of a poor but respec-
table man named High, with whose daughter she
was on very intimate terms, having on a mask made
to resemble an ass's bead. Finding the poor girl
alone, and thinking to enjoy a tine piece of fun in
frightening her, she insisted on her dancing. The
poor creature was so, dreadfully frightened, that she
fell into ♦iolent fits, which continued for some time,
when she became a decided lunatic ; but the shock her
whole frame had sustained was too violent, and nature
gave way to the sufferings consequent thereon. A few
days ago she died a sacrifice to the thoughtless folly of
a foolish companion, whose own mind must be greatly
embittered by the melancholy reflection.—Cambridge
Advertiser.