Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1875-03-05

language with a coldness of eve and
tone. A man who Is an enthusiast will
throw about his limbs, and feeling will
CLEAN from his face but this man spoke
always by rote, like an actor who has got
| up part.
/ was about TO insist on departure
when there passed us, very hastily in
deed, a stranger dressed in black. What
struck me about him was the singular
| fact that could see him but could not
hear any sound. He must have worn
fantasllcally-thin boots; or perhaps he
wore slippers-which would be little
unusual on cold afternoon in Decem.
Der. Anyway, he was totally inaudible,
and, gliding like vision, he passed
under an archway in the direction of
Little Deans yard.
!" Did you see that manY" asked my
friend.
lie looked not little disturbed, then
he said, hurriedly, and with obvious
effort.
"No-what manY I was thinking at
the instant of this interesting passage
which led to Little Deans yard. 1t
was one of the oldest bits of the
Abbey. II has of course been spoiled
by Observation-Disclosures, like the
cathedral piety; but you cannot efface
the real Do you know, believe If you
can detach the beauties of London from
the mass Of modernism and money and
place them in one spot by themselves
you would make resort compared to
which Rome would be dustbin and
Athens Ramsgate and Margate"
thought this absurd, but did not say
so. My friend was obviously mad. But
then his white hair-his very white hair
seemed to give him excuse for being
exceptional; since age has the tight to be
dogmatic with youth, and was but a
youth in his presence.
We were now IN the passage which my
friend had panegyrized as one OF the most
ancient of the Abbey. Ancient or not,
it was certainly dark, and could scarce.
ly see where was going. Hardly con
scious OF what l was doing, or why !
should feel very anxious, | looked over
my shoulder behind me. perceived in
the darkness that same strange figure
which had passed us three minutes be-
fore. Not sound-not mufiied one
the human being alone-its form-its
very dark form,
Now here / might descend from these
very lofty heights of aesthetic disouisi.
tion and lore, with which my friend had
instructed me, and tell plainly, exactly
what happened. | am not going to do
anything of the kind. If the reader
wishes to enjoy an account of robbery,
of garroting with violence in London"
he has only to take in" copies of Rey-
n0tds' Sunday Newspaper, and he will be
q 1'e to satisfy his yearnings. | was gar
re ed; but since the sensation was quite
my nd
to live IL over again, the reader will be
so kind as to supply his Imagination
with whatever particulars he peases. l
lost my bank notes. | never recovered
them. But let that fact suffice as to de.
tail. l hate garroting, both the reading
OF it and the suffering it myself; and /
shall not allude farther to the subject.
so soon as recovered Ipassed through
Deans yard and made for the cloisters.
l hailed policeman and informed him
of my wrongs He stationed himself
just outside the gate, and we two waited
future results.
We stood perhaps five minutes; nobody
passed. But just as | was despairing of
any success a gentleman, aged perhaps
thirty, with very black hair and black
whskers, and jaunty and juvenile mien,
came out of the yard through the arch
way. He was not my friend My friend
was sixty, was white, was aged this man
was exuberant with youth.
| scarcely bestowed even one glance on
this gentleman; but my surprise was in
tense on seeing the policeman instantly
collar and handcuff him. He was the
man. BY singular coincidence he had
been watched the night before round the
cloisters of Westminster Abbey. He
In 20 NIn
been tracked more than once in these
lairs by a detective dressed in plain
clothes. He was frequenter of inter
esting places, in toilets more or less
grave. He had even been known to be
Bishop in the Crystal Palace at Syden-
ham. He was fond of assuming a dig
nitied character, with leaning toward
venerable age. Pity that society misun-
derstood him! With such versatility of
talent he might have risen very high in
some of the branches of Legitimate
felony"
Briefly, my friend was first-class
thief; he had graduated in the klepto-
maniac college. Not precisely at Oxford
nor accurately at Dublin, he had never
theless taken his degree. M. A. he was,
though the "A A" might be equivocal in
the moral of its range, while doubtless
difficult to "master." He had been at
very good school, and, as it transpired
not many days afterward when his story
was told before a magistrate, he had
once gained prize for Latin compost.
ton and had been second for an exhibi-
tion at Oxford. His boast was therefore
well founded. He had merely directed
into feloniOus channels the abilities
which were meant for conventional
Belgrduia.