BEGGARS.
BEGGARS are certainly a nuisance. One meets a beggar with a doubt whether to give him something, and run the risk dl' throwing away money on a scoundrel; or to pass on, giving him nothing, and perchance leave real and undeserved suffering without relief. Either way one's peace of mind is disturbed : the doubt and the fear of having done wrong, whichever course is adopted, haunt us long after the beggar has iu a similar manner harrassed the feelings of many other unoffending citizens. Beggars are certainly a nui- sance; which, to follow out the phrase in due legal form, " ought to be abated."
But even beggars are human beings after all, and their punish- ment ought to bear some proportion to their guilt. In all other cases of law-breach, some difference is made between young beginners and old offenders ; and no one place is thought to privi- lege misdemeanour more than another. This is not the case with beggars. The young and the old receive equal measures of pun- ishment; and what is sternly suppressed in some quarters is tacitly permitted in others. A boy was brought up at Clerkenwell, for hawking coloured prints in Euston Square. The reporter avers, that he was an " innocent, intelligent-looking child" : these words may pass as put in to make up the line and the penny paid for it ; but it is also said that he was only eleven dears of age. The Magistrate humanely suggested that the prints were too " nice" to be had for the money the boy said he gave for them ; but the Policeman informed his Worship that it was their real price. Whereupon the Magistrate fell back upon the plea that " the sale of the prints was but an excuse for beggging "; and he sent the boy to the House of Correction for fourteen days. Now shift the scene to a place only two miles distant from Eustou Square, every way similar to it in its relative position to city and suburbs, and equally blessed with the guardian angels of the Police. If the lady of Euston Square, to whom the boy was seen to offer his prints for sale, resided in this other quarter of London, she could not walk half-a-mile in broad day-light without having plump applications from hulking grown- up men for charity ; and in the event of her passing on without noticing them, she might have her ears saluted with " May you have ill-luck ! " or " May you die before the week's at an end !" Perhaps the Police and Magistrates are less offended with avowed begging, which is a natural infirmity, than with the hypocrisy of begging under pretence of selling : but then, what are all these re- spectable persons who ply their brushes with impunity at every crossing in fine dry weather (comparatively few make their appear- ance in rainy muddy days) but disguised beggars ? There is a class of beggars, for not arresting whom, the Police, through their forbearance, have at first sight the appearance of favouritism : hence the excuse that it is difficult to detect them. We mean the "gentlemen" who go about collecting subscriptions for the innumerable societies got up in all quarters of the Metro- polis under pretext of rectifying minor abuses. These worthies travel in the suburbs, and intrude upon the female part of the family when the gentlemen of the house are absent upon business. 'They are in general tolerably well-dressed, and sometimes take the title of captain. They talk in the style of familiar visitors—criti- cize the paintings, it' any—perhaps ask for "a glass of wine and crust of bread"—and, by dint of vulgar, familiar, swaggering im- pudence, generally succeed in intimidating the ladies upon whom they intrude themselves into a donation of a crown—"the very lowest they can think of accepting." In fairness to the Police, it must be admitted that beggars of this stamp are not easily got hold of. Something ni;ght be done by holding the President and Directors of the Society, (Bridge-toll- abrogation, or whatever it may call itself,) in whose name the offender begs, liable to the punishment he would undergo if caught. As they let loose the class of offenders on society, this holding them responsible for all who assume the character, might be a spur
to them to select respectable agents and put down unauthorized in- terlopers. Game of this kind would be worth a Magistrate's run- ning down ; and the general relief afforded by a cheek being put upon the " gentleman beggars" would induce the public to pardon the Justices even though now and then, sated with nobler prey, they let slip a minor offender, and punished a child for hawking a few prints less severely than with " fourteen days of the House of Correction."
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