REVIVAL OF '1.1:11, ROBBER TRADE.
BOBRERs of striking adroitness or daring, consigned for some time to the melodramatic theatre, are again visiting real life, with an audacity that is embarrassing to lovers of orderly ease. Several cases of recent occurrence are calculated to disturb the reliance on New Police, gas, and other modern improvements, in the most un- pleasant manner. And although the newest robbers prove to be quite up to the standard in point of audacity, i they do not show any improvement in point of good feeling. There more of the Dick Turpin in them than of the Claude du Val. The murder of Mr. Honest will instil forgotten alarms into the bosom of many a family. Mr. Rolled, perpetual curate of Frim- ley Grove, near Farnborough, is resting at night with his wife When they are awakened by the presence at their bedside of two ; masked men ; they call out, they ring bells, and ultimately raise an alarm; but not without a desperate struggle and the use of mortal weapons ; the ruffians at last make off, and then Mr. Hol- iest discovers that he is-wounded—mortally, for he dies in a few hours. It appears that three men had effected an entrance by the removal of one bolt in the scullery-window, and they carried off a good deal of property. The mode of the .robbery showed that it had been well calculated, and that the men were experienced in such crimes. From this case, it is to be inferred, that robbery of property, at present—for there are fashions even in burglery7is accompanied by bloody violence; also that if there is property in a country-house, the hinderance to intrusion should not rest upon a single loolt.
The robbery of the Reverend 0. E. Tidal, of Arlington in Sus- sex, was not fatal, probably because the victim did not resist. His room is entered at night, successively, by two masked men, one carrying a sword, the other an axe-handle ; he is forced down stairs, and, with the edge of a sword at his throat, compelled to disclose the place where he keeps his money. In both this case and the other, the robbers did not make off precipitately, but deli- berately regaled themselves with good fare.
The attack on Mr. Cureton, of the British Museum, is in some respects even more startling. Three " gentlemen" are admitted "on business'; they negotiate the purchase of medals ; and while Mr. Cnreton is stooping over a drawer, a strangulating machine is put round his neck, he is left in a dying state, and the robbers car- ry off a booty in medals. That Mr. Cureton's life remains to him, is certainly not due to their mercy. This last outrage is committed in broad ,daylight, in Aldersgate Street, the very centre of London, surrounded by the Metropolitan Police. Yet t,lie,ip,tfiv.pt is as daring as any ascribed to Jack Sheppard. To the most daring class of desperadoes the common apliances for the protection of society afford a sort of ivn.more e,ffectual ambush. The efficacy of the peliee,-N,,, example, upon the whole is such that no, blundering rexinimakeinneec tection, and such outrages as the three , we h q}enttoticd seem to be nearly impossible. Bu,t the habit of sppty cljsarips vigilance against the assault of men so utterly roe eas pf the
If the possessor of property must not trust a sin bolt at night, the possessor of very, portable property past not trust strange companions, although they may seem gentlemen." The moral of
it all is distrust. TheAventurea of the 1phi Theatre are once more becoming common realities;; and the 4. ousnes of
the victim on the stage, who persists in h t ve the blow most conveniently, would seem to hav to actual life. Will the publicpersist in that non nGe ? in future, a Mr. Cureton will suspect every strange " gentleman, ' and will prevent his "getting behind" ; every Mr. Holiest will have more bolts to his scullery, and to the inner doors of his house.
Not that we would advocate a timid fear of aw contingencies : but precaution is not timidity, especially wherOaits to needy desperadoes exist in the shape of portabler,prope*. We remem- ber to have heard a gentleman of /mown 11:priour, who had been in prison for a political offence in the days of bigh Toryism, report the confidential opinion of a burglar wbeni he encountered in gaol, as to the best obstructions against midnight entry. For a street-door, the robber said, a chain is,a more perplexing obstruc- tion than locks, bolts, or bars ;, both at :windows and doors, bells are a serious disturbance.; but worst of all is a little yapping dog, that does not attack intruders, but runs away barking.
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