The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-12-27
The MEssINIAN SYSTEM OF POLICE.

lar nom Mount Etna, IN Sicily, o beautiful
city, called Messina, which exists to this day,
and bears the same name. In common with
the country around it, it bore traces of long
series of conquests incident to the military
enterprises of the Carthaginians and the Ro-
mans, and to the warlike turbulence which
unsettled Europe for SO many years after the
fall of the Roman Empire. 1t had been
Reconstructed, in some sense, as often as it
had passed under a new dominion and the
more it underwent reconstruction the more
profound and inveterate became its domestic
troubles, the more confused and vexatious
the laws prescribed for its government, and
the more loose, negligent, inefficient and
stupid their administration.
In the period referred to, William Shak-
speare was writing plays for the English
stage and among his plays was the comedy
of Much Ado About Nothing" which had
for its place of action Messina, and for one
Of its principal personages the Duke of Mes
sina. The author had occasion, in one of the
scenes of this comedy, to sketch the system
recon structed city. The fidelity and felicity
of this description were at first a matter of
little note either to critical judgment or to
popular estimation. For Shakespeare was re-
garded in his own day simply as clever,
facile and prolific dramatist. 1t was only by
degrees that his universally of genius, his
panachronism of sympathy and insight,
dawned upon the literary world until at
length this revelation shaped itself into the
expression, now as familiar as household
words, that he "wrote for all time" And
there is nothing, we are satisfied, more cal
culated to impress the mind with this remark
able and god-like quality of his writings than
the subjoined dialogue from the scene to
which We have adyerted as descriptive of the
constabulary peculiarities of reconstruct
ed" city about two centuries ago:
Enter DoeBERRY and vERGEs tcih the Watch.
Dogb. Are you good men and true?
Verg. Yes, or else il were pity but they should
euffer salvation, body and soul.
DOg6. Nay, that were punishment too good
for them, If they should have any allegiance in
them. being chosen for the princes watch.
Verg. Well, give them their charge, neighbor
Dogberry!
Dogb: First, who think you the most desartless
man to be constable
/ Watch. Hugh Oatcake, sir, or George Seac pal;
for they can write and read
Dogb. Come hither. neighbor Sescoal: God hath
blessed you with good name to be q well IA
voured man is the gift Of fortune; but TO write aud
read comes by nature.
Watch. Both which master constable
Dogb. You have; knew it would be your an
swer. Well, for your favour, sir, why, give God
thanks, and make no boast Of it, and for your
writing and reading, let that appear when there is
no need of such vanity. You ere thought here TO
be The most senseess and fit man for the constable
of the watch; therefore bear you the lantern. This
is your charge: you shall comprehend all vayrom
men; you are to bid any man stand, in the princes
name.
2 Watch How If he will not stand?
DOg6. Why, then, take no note of him, but let
him go and presently call the rest of the watch
Together, and thank God you are rid of the
kDsve.
VeJ. If he will not stand when he is hidden,
be is none Of the princes subjects.
Dogb. True, and they are TO NEEDLE with none
but the princes subjects You shall also make
no noise In the streets; for, for the watch to
bsbble and talk, is most toleIable and not to be
endured.
Q Watch. We will rather sleep than talk; we
know what belongs to watch.
most quiet Waterman; for l cannot see how
sleeping should offend; only have a care that
your bills be not stolen. Well, You to call at
all the ale houses, and bid those that are drunk
get them to bed.
Watch. How if they will not?
Dog6. Why then, let them alone till they are
sober; If they make You not then the better an
sver. you may say, they are not the men you
took them for.
Watch. Well, sir.
Dogb. II you meet thief. you may suspect
him, by virtue Of your Office, TO be no true man /:
and, for such kind Of men, the less you NEEDLE or
make with them, why, the more is for your
honesty.
2 Watch II we know him to be a thief, shall we
not lay hands on him,
Dogb. Truly, by your Office, you may; but
think they that touch pitch will be defed: the
most peaceable way for you. IL you do take q
thief Is 10 let him show himself what he is and to
steal ont of your company.
VTg If you hear a child cry in the night, you
must call to the nurse, and bid her still 1t.
Watch. How if the nurse be asleep, and will
not bear us?
Dogb. Why, then, depart in peace and let the
child wake her With crying for the eve that will
not hear her lamb when it bays, will never an.
swer a calf when he beats.
Verg. IT'S very true.
Dogb.; This is the end Of the charge. You,
constable, are TO present the princes own per- |
son IL you meet the prince in the night you may |
stay him.
Veyg. Nay. by'r lady. that, think. he cannot. |
Dogb, Five shillings 20 one ont, with any nan |
that knows the statues, he may stay him marry,
not without the prince be willing, for, indeed the
watch ought to offend no man, and it is ofense
10 stay man against bis will.
Ve-g. By'r lady, ! think it be so.
Do96 Ha. hs, ha! Well, masters. good night;
gu lntFe De any mdttoI OIL NtiBut chdnceS Cdli up
me keep your fellows counsels and your own,
and good night. Come. neighbor.
Watch. Well, masters, we hear our charge
let Us so cit here upon the church-bench till Two,
and then all to bed.
Thei citizen of New Orleans who can not
see INF the tenor Of the Messinian conference
an ante-type of the institution, called the
METROPOLITAN Police, which reconstruction has
given New Orleans, is wofully behind the
time, most assuredly. If such a man there
be, be is incapable of thinking or writing for
this or for any other time and should be, for his
own sake and for the benefit of socity,
"cut Cor the simples" The supreme thought
with tie Messinian constabulatory was how not
to do 'twith the utmost solemnity Of indoent
and eonceited ignorance. They were we'll
content if they could fatten upon the unearned
provend of organized imbecility 1t was the
rogueis or the "vagrom mans own fault if he
managed to be caught in their shallow and
rotten meshes. The parting remark of the