The Wadsworth dispatch. [volume] (Wadsworth, Nev.) 1892-1899, 1894-05-23
MAKES PESSIlIISTS.
SERVICE AT THE POLICE SERGEANT'S
DESK IN A BIG CITY.

Brought Before Eim-He Is a Judge In
Petty Cases-Some Average Samples.
The people whose business compels them
to seek information from the police ser
geant behind the desk may wonder why it
Is that he habitually bears an aspect of set
tied, changeless melancholy, why his
words are few and short, and why he car
ries the manner of a man who has lost all
faith in humanity. 1t is easily explained.
The police sergeant sees nothing but the
night side of life. By virtue of his office
he must receive all criminal charges made
in his precinct, consign the offender to the
cells and enter the record in the blotter
that lies on the desk in front of him. In
all cases where the police of a precinct
make an arrest he is the court of first re-
sort. Before his eye pass all grades OF Of
Tenders, from the murderer who shall ulti-
mately expiate his crime in the electric
chair to the wretched, shaking, whisky
soaked heap of rags found lying dead
drunk on the sidewalk. On his judg-
ment frequently depends the fate of the
culprit brought before him, for in most
petty offenses the sergeant is invested with
the power of dismissing the complaint or
OBTAINING the, prisoner for examination by
the magistrate. The police sergeant must
thus exercise the incest Judgment and tact
and the flrmest decision in dealing with
the hundred varied cases that come before
him in the ours of n day. Oftener he has
to exercise the quality of mercy. Hourly
appeals are made to his pity, and If he be
a kind hearted mainland he generally is
kind hearted man-his task becomes all
the harder.
What is called the might tour" or, in
other words, the period of desk duty be-
tween 6 and 12 o'clock at night, is gener-
ally the most trying time for the sergeant
in a busy up town precinct. 1t is then
that the station gets the bulk of the days
business. That tall, portly, %sunburnt, md
die aged man seated at a desk behind the
prisoners rail is the sergeant. While the
captain, his superior officer, Is securing
the precinct, he is In command of the sta
ton. This particular sergeant has a bald
head, a moist eye, a heavy black mustache
and a voice husky with the wind, rain and
snow of many winters. An old, white,
crooked scar across the forehead tells of a
saber cut received at Antietam. He is a
picturesque sight as he sits there bathed in
the light of the shaded lamps, calmly rul-
ing his books with a preoccupied air, as If
no bowling fury of a IN were shrek
ing for somebody's blood in the cells be-
low. He only looks up when the door is
thrown open, and there shambles up to the
desk the ragged, torn, blear eyed, bag
gard remains of something which had once
been q man. Immediately the air becomes
i~mpregnated with the odor of stale gin and
onions. The creature has not spoken a
woodworking but a sound which might
be a sob, or q sigh, or q whine has broken
from him, but the sergeant knows why he
Is there. ''Phewl" he exclaims, with a
Whit Of disgust. "Go back" To ''go
back" mean to go to the Migrants lodg-
ing room in the rear of the police station,
where wanderers are sheltered for tho
night. Who would think to look at him
now" says the sergeant, "that that thing
was once a prominent criminal lawyer in
the old Tweed dayss remember him when
l was a patrolman. What settled him?
Why, poker without the limit first, and
then old rye afterward."
Almost before the words have left his
mouth there is heard outside a wild scat
tering of feet, a hum of voices, the two
doors arc thrown wide open, and there en-
ter two patrolmen, dragging across the
floor at a smart trot the inanimate form of
a man. They make no stop at the desk,
but run past into the patrolmen's sitting
room and there stop. The whole process
sion has passed by like a swiftly moving
panorama, and it is in a kind of dull sur
prise that one follows the sergeant into the
sitting room to take look at the new Wis
itor. Dead drunk against q lamppost''
ia fha natrO1Ynap, % uorliot ON tho ,,noOn-
scious figure. Ho Is middle aged, is dressed
in clothes of tho best make and has the re-
sponsible gray head and the responsible
side whiskcrs of a banker or a stockbroker.
His heavy gold watch and his pocketbook
containing an ample supply of bills are
taken from him. Too many of this sort, -
says the sergeant in answer to a remark.
Then to the patrolman he says, Put his
coat under his head and let him lie there
until he Is able to give us his name"
A colored party next claims the ser
geant's attention. Two colored women
living In the same house have waged a Bit
ter feud for about two weeks. Tonight
one Of the combatants has received the
contents of a bowl of water thrown from
a second floor window, and she at once sus-
poets the other. Their husbands nave been
drawn into the fight, and here all four
stand in line demanding the punishment of
the law each n on the other. Clear out
of here" says the sergeant when he has
listened to the tale, land learn to live
peaceably, or I'll hold the whole crowd as
common ~nuisances." Later he adds: 1T
is the only thing to do with them. If I
took the charge, it's ten to one they'd
square matters up before morning"
Next comes q woman with a baby in her
arms. She has been in the streets home
less and penniless. Her husband is dead.
Failure in trade has deprived her of work,
and she has been turned from her lodging.