The Statesman.
London, England, 1820-09-09 00:00:00

Iololllll.l7lToftAt BARLY.LIFE of MR. M(INT.
Iffeallswoirs of Henry flout, Mg. written by bkoself.)
•
(Concluded from yesterday's Statesman.)
. *pooh had nearly passed, and with most of the
las &Affair began to wear ofh 'and it was seldom
;;;1011.1; not so with me, it pressed very heavily
isa fig wind, and instead of being one of the most
boys in the school, I was now become quite
ti and even melancholy, and was frequently ob.
old to shed tears. My friends endeavour'd to rally
.oreet of this what they called sulky moor! ; I replied
bill could not help it, that I should never again he
tory till it was discovered who it was that took my
flow's money ; and that its being lost while k
was his bed-fellow, certainly threw a sort of suspicion
on me, that I could not get over, apd to labour under
&deb remit-red me completely miserable. 'They all
endeavoured to laugh me ont of this humour, and
oast say that Scott himself did every thing in his Meer
to relieve me; but it was all in vain, I not only grew
wagma ?, bat I bogus to lose my appetite, and as I '
Looked very thin and ill, Mrs. Evens was somewhat
abriael, and said every thing she could to comfort
ree. Alas' it was all in vain, and I really began to
think that I should fall a victim to false accusation,
f„, d flad SO sleep by night, nor ease by day.
Mrs. divans now proposed to send for my father,
which is few days she did. When he arrived and
was informed of the circumstances, he felt greatly dis-
tressed. I was sent for into the parlour ; my father
was shocked at my appearing in such health, and the
azonv of his feelings was intense at the cause of my
ibess. Ile entreated me, by the love 1 bore towards
hint and my mother, to confes. s the truth ; if I had in
an unguarded moment been led into an error, the only
reparation was openly to confess it, and, in that case,
be offered immediately to repay Scott his money, and
to make him a handsome present besides ; in fact he
promised to do any thing. Before he would allow
me to make an answer, he went almost upon his knees,
and implored me to tell him the whole truth, proffer-
ing at the same time his entire forgiveness if I had
&twit. I assured him in the most serious and solemn
manner, that I knew nothing whatever of the money,
that it had made me very unhappy indeed, that I had I
had no sleep for the last eight or ten nights, and had
lost my appetite, and that I was become very weak
and ill ; which illness he found, by feeling my pulse,
was attended with a veer considerable fever. Ile pro.
posed to take me home 'for a short time, to restore my
health ; but this I objected to, as being likely to give
aco our to the charge. It was therefore settled that
should take some medicine, prescribed by Dr. Stiles,
to calm rily spirits and allay my fever. •
My fatl.er returned home almost broken-hearted,
and l confirmed in the same melancholy and hopeless
state. However, in the evening of the next Sunday,
a lot- ratite running np to rue almost breathless, and
declared that he hail discovered the thief, who hid
stolen the money. I eagerly intreated hint to explain
himself—be answered that Charles Best, together
with kit brother James. bad just brought in a haffed
of Carratcqy Comfits, which he said be had bought
with live shillings, given to biro by his father. The
Father of these hoes lived in the town, and they had
been home on the Sunday, as was usual, to dine with
him. They hal just returned from their visit, about
eight o'clock in the evening, and Charles. the eldest,
the fellow who had acrnsed me of being the thief, had
now brought these comfits in his hat, saying that his fa-
titer had given hitnfire shilling's, which he had expend-
ed at once in this way. My friend directly declared
that it was a falsehood, that his father was a cursedly
stingy old fellow, and that he had never before re-
turned with more than sixpence in his pocket ; and he
aided, ruppose his father or any other person hail
given hint five shillings, it was very unlikely that he
w.oild lay it all out at once in such a manner. I re-
quested Best to show us his purse, to see if he had
any more money in it. This he declined to do; and,
as his brother James began to shuffle, and did not
es)rfirm hinz altogether in his story, I immediately
seized him by the collar, and having tripped up his
heels, called fur assistance to search him. This we
accomplished with some difficulty, and having gut at
his purse, we found it contained sixteen shillings in
silver more. lie now changed his tale, boil asserted
that his father had given him a guinea, which he had
changed at Mrs. iladding's the pie-woman; that he
had purchased five shillings-worth of carraway comfits,
and the sixteen shillings was the remainder of the
change.
By the manner of his telling this story it was evi-
dently false. Some of the boys accordingly kept him.
in custody, while myself and my friend, who had first
brought me the intelligence, rushed out of the house,
regardless of the consequences, and proceeded as fast
as possible to the house of old Best, either to have this
account confirmed or denied. On our reaching the
door we knocked with gm at authority, and upon the
servant's opening it, we marched in without any cero-
tawny, and demanded an audience of his master imme-
diately, as we had some very important business with
him. The servant informed hint of our visit, and be
came ant of the parlour to ns, anti demanded what
liu‘iness we could have with him at that time of night,
it being then nearly nine o'clock. We first asked if
his sons had been home to dine will him; he answer-
ed yes, and that they hail left his house upwards of an
hour ago. in order to return to the school, and he
wished to know whether they bad not arrived before
we left. We replied that they had. We then asked
Lim if he had given his son Charles any money ; he
at once said, " Certainly not." His mother might
have given him sixpence, but if she did it- was without
his knowledge. Ile then returned into the parlour;
anti we heard him ask his wife if she had given Charles
any money to-day, the answer was, " No, my dear."
any
was quite enough for us, and without waiting
any further cerest•ony, we started off back to the school.
In the roman time, Best, having ascertained that we
were gone to his father to make enquiry, had con-
fessed that it was he who had stolen the esesty eat
of .Scutt's pocket ; and when we returned he was see-
rounded by all the boys, who were upbraiding sad
taunting him with Me villainy ; but they were all
more enraged with bite for his baseness in accusing
me of the theft, than they were with the theft itself.
I was the only one who expressed any pity for him,
awl had the weakness to solicit fur that *nervy to be