The interest in the examination of the three detective inspectors,
Druscovieh, Palmer, and Meiklejohn, on the charge of aiding and abetting the escape of the five men convicted of swindling Madame de Goncourt out of 210,000, has much increased. This is in consequence of the news that a detective-serjeant at Scot- land Yard, Von Tornow, whose name appeared in one of Meiklejohn's letters produced in Court, has absconded ; and of course, the wildest stories are now abroad. Few facts other than those indicated by Mr. Poland last week have come to light. Kerr, the convict, who has given the authorities all the information, states that he and Meiklejohn had dealings long before the Goncourt fraud ; that he had once sent him 2100 for "settling a little matter" about illegal book-making in Scotland ; that on another occasion he gave him £500; and that, in fact, he found it his interest to keep a police-officer in his pay while he esta- blished the Systematic Investment Society, the General Society .for Insurance against Losses on the English Turf, and other flimsy devices for evading the law. If Kerr's story be true, Meiklejohn was a sort of standing counsel to a betting gang for years. The prosecution rely strongly on the omission of material details from Druscovich's report. The crowd continue to cheer the con- vict, who is vaguely regarded as a hero of some new kind, and to hoot and hiss the detectives. Whatever be the issue of the trial, Colonel Henderson will not satisfy the public unless he makes many changes at Scotland Yard, where, it is pretty clear, there is too little control over experienced inspectors. Our detectives are picking up, we fear, some of the worst vices of the French police, without getting their discipline or skill.
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