Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1889-07-04
a nsssMSRIo swINDLBs.
what Gan he Done With Such a
Mnn AS This2


LONDON, June 28 The crown prose.
cutor of the city of Northampton, in
the county Of Stafford, is in quandary.
The police there have in custody young
man who ia undoubtedly worthy of
severe punishment, and yet his crime is
so entirely novel thBt he probably cannot
be punished at all unless the old statutes
against witchcraft are revised, In which
case he might be comfortably roasted
before slow fire.
This young man, whose name Is Lewis
Albert, is graduate Of Oxford Univer-
sity. Soon after he left college he be-
came interested in mesmerism, mind
reading aud hypnotism, and, as a result
OF natural gifts or close study, soon be-
came 80 expert that for time he travelled
about giving exhibitions of his powers.
He acquired wonderful influence over
the will power Of certain classes Of people,
and established such reputation that he
might have made his exhibitions very
profitable but for an unfortunate pen.
chant for the flowing bowl.
This brought him SO low that three
months ago he turned up in Wolver-
hampton in rags and without money or
friends. Then he began to hypn0tize
with vengeance. Small shopkeepers,
usually women, began to discover that
the contents OF their tills very mys-
toiiously dwindled after visit from the
urbane stranger. Just what his method
Of procedure was none could tell, but
when they found. on comparing notes,
that their losses invariably followed the
visits of the polite Albert, they set the
police to watch him.
Then some startling discoveries were
made. His custom was to enter shop,
make purchase of some trifie and put
down copper in payment. Then the
hypnotizing and mesmerizing process
must have been Brought into requisition,
for the shopkeeper in every case took up
the copper and promptly handed out the
change for soyereign, which the young
man promptly pocketed. In only one
case while the police were on his track
were there failure to befog his victim
in this way.
The detective who followed him aboul
was mystifed for long time, being Mt
terly unable to account for the hallucina
tions which invariably seizsd Albert't
victims and led them to mistake copper
coin for a gold sovereign, and it WAS only
after discovering his professional recorc
that he began to understand it.
Albert's last victim was youth Of 49,
the attendant at the box office of {
theatre, in Wolverhampton. He stepped
up to the window, boldly asked for {
shilling ticket, handed the boy dirty
scrap OF newspaper and received q
change, without the slightest hesitation
on the part of the boy, four sovereign
and nineteen shillings. While walkinl
of with this he was arrested by tn
officer who had besn shadowing him TO
two weeks.
The boy in the box Office was dumb
founded when his attention was called t,
the scrap OF newspaper in his cash box
aud still stoutly insisted that the gentle
man had handed him five-pound note
Ee remembered, however, that a peculia
sensation came over him, which he dc
scribes as Q sort of numbneRs, when tn
man first approached the window of tn
office.
The legal status OF Albert's offence
very difficult to determine, as II il with
outa precendent, and good lawyers ga
there is no law in England to puniah him
The case is exciting great interest.