By starts pathetic, and whiles vehement- In tears well did he know and play his part; At his own lodgings; for his friends were kind. Mingled with smiles, and quiddities, and quips; All, all is vain," he said—and worshipped them. " Religion's mountebanks-of all the worst- And mourn the sinner while they chide the wrong; And, while their life's refreshing current flows, In them their lovely office lovelier shews.t he would say, "Some o' you will think I comes too close to the marrow, but I loves to shave close." This man preached to his jewels thrice on the Sun's day, and every evening of the other days dedicated in our language to some heathen divinity, excepting that of Saturn. He was deposed, and therefore not worthy of attention from the gracious bricklayer. The class I have described is common enough. I have seen not a few individuals belonging to it. They all get fat. Even the jolly Boatswain has made a good thing of it. The author again repeats that, while no one despises more than himself the cant and humbug of pretenders, no one respects more those who "do their spiriting gently;" who, by their disinterested conduct, devoted zeal, unassuming demeanour, and apostolical simplicity, shew that they are worthy disciples of Him who came once in humiliation, and worthy heirs of the promises which are theirs when He shall come again in his glory. No. XLIX. LEIGH HUNT, ESQ. LEIGH HUNT Complained sadly of the pickpocket look which the malice or want of skill of an engraver had conferred on that copy of his countenance which decorated his book about Lord Byron. We hope that he will think our artist has succeeded better; although truth compels us to confess that there is not much of the style noble in the physiognomy of the ci-devant sonnetteer of Hampstead, even though "its intelligence relieves it from insignificance." Hunt has written in a hundred different places all the particulars of his personal history, and we are thereby relieved from any pressing necessity of expatiating on his biography. He was once very warlike with his pen, and fond of controversy - but that occurred when he was calidus juventá— In his hot youth, when George the Third was king. Time and the wear of the world has smoothed the roughness of his ire, and his quills bristle not for the conflict as of old. Once upon a time he was ready to attack every body, from the Prince Regent down to the poor scene-shifter; and he tells us he then thought that a satire was nothing more than "a pleasant thing in a book." He felt the difference when the Northerns dubbed him King of the Cockneys. He is now far more tolerant of mankind; but he still preserves in considerable bloom all the grand characteristics of his original career,— the jauntiness and greenery, the theatrical orange-suckery, the suburban relishes, the admiration of all that is of the town, towny. He prattles as ever of green fields, and fancies that he knows something of fine breeding and the fine air of a gentleman of the West End. His pet words still cling to him in spite of all vicissitudes of time and fortune; and it is impossible to mistake an article of his, whether marked by the ruffled or not. By the way, he ought to put a sham diamond ring on the index finger-it would look more sparkish; or sport a daffydowndilly from the back of Jack Straw's in the hand, thereby to shew that the farmy fields of Hampstead are not forgotten. We grieved somewhat, on looking over his last edition of Rimini, when we missed the old familiar faces of these five lines, which had excited the savage criticism of Gifford. It was weak of Hunt to leave out these purple patches—~ "The thigh broad spread-the pressing thumb upon it; And the jerked feather swaling in the bonnet;" or, or, "The two divinest things the world has got- "She had stout notions on the marrying score;" or the hundred magnificent words which had called up the bile of the critical sutor who smote Hunt with his crepida. The poem did not appear to us any thing like what it was some-almost twenty years ago, when we read it with infinite gratification, chiefly on account of these charming specimens of composition. Why should he have cared for his critics? They were no friends of his. And had we been Hunt we should have stuffed the poem ten times fuller of Cockneyisms, and not abated a rhyme to oblige the non-residents of London, who think that Anna ought not to be pronounced Annar. We should have shewn the provincials our intense contempt of their notions of the English tongue, and in the honour of Bow-bell have rhymed tobacco with Long Acre, as in the days of old. He is now coming somewhat beyond that mezzo cammin of which Dante sings, and fortune has not smiled upon him. The party to which he formerly attached himself is in power, but all his old labours in the libel line on their behalf are forgotten. Those who abused the Prince Regent with far greater virulence than Hunt ever did are high in office, and glorying in their elevation. They have of course left him to struggle as he can. We hope that his struggling is successful -- we understand, indeed, that his Journal has, as it deserves to have, a prosperous sale. It is as refreshing as his former productions, and of a pleasanter spirit. He has been an excessively ill-used man in many respects, and by none more than by Lord Byron, and those who panegyrise his lordship,With the twaddle of Allan, the meanness of Moore." And so fare thee well, and prosper " Signor Le IIunto, gran gloria di Cocagna." IMPRISONMENT FOR DEBT, AND THE INSOLVENT DEBTORS' COURT. BY THE AUTHOR OF "OLD BAILEY EXPERIENCE." THE indiscriminate imprisonment for debt is not only wicked and unjust, but extensively mischievous to society; yet for ages after ages have governments pertinaciously held on in their course of opposition to the opinions of the wisest and most enlightened men in all epochs of time. There are three kinds of debtors; first, the unfortunate but honest debtor, who would pay if he were able; secondly, the litigious debtor, who is able but unwilling to pay, and seldom does so until compelled by the law, -instances of which occur in high life as often as in the lower walks; [for example. A short time since, the coachman of a certain noble lord came to town a few days before his master, to give directions for his reception, and was put into a damp bed through the culpable negligence of the housekeeper. When the family arrived, the coachman was in a high fever, and the steward immediately sent for the nearest medical man in the neighbourhood; who, on his arrival, intimated to the steward, that he hoped there was no mistake, as he was not in the habit of attending the family. The steward replied, "No, our apothecary is out of town; but I have his lordship's orders, and will see you paid." The man was several times bled and leeched, but got worse; when a physician was called in, and his fee given him by the steward. The pȧtient eventually died, the apothecary attending him with assiduity to the last. When the bill was sent in, amounting to three pounds odd shillings, both his lordship and the steward refused to pay, saying, " it was a debt of the deceased;" and it remains unpaid to this day. Similar anecdotes are currently related of many of our aristocratical families. The principal in this case is a popular advocate for liberty; and it is but too generally known, that some of the most popular and strenuous bawlers for liberty and justice have but a scurvy name in private life, either for honour, honesty, or liberality.] Lastly, the fraudulent debtor,- that is to say, the man who contracts debts without either the prospect or the intention of paying thein, but for the sole purpose of swindling. In the first case (the honest man), VOL. IX. NO. LIV. when society discovers a fallen man, it inflicts a punishment severe enough for the crime of mere misfortune. Poverty, however well clothed in honesty, seldom meets with a smile among Englishmen; adversity encounters, at every turn, a drawn-up mouth and a contracted brow: it needs not, therefore, the terrors of a prison to deter a man from insolvency, it is a catastrophe in a man's life which brings its own punishment, and is a condition in which no man wilfully places himself. Solomon was a wise man, and Sampson a strong one; but we never heard that either of them could pay debts without money, or means to obtain it. prison is a place to spend it, not to acquire it durance, then, is useless as to restitution; and if inflicted for punishment, why treat the innocent and guilty with the same harshness? The fact, however, is, that it is those who acquire riches who are generally the greatest delinquents in society. The Insolvent Debtors' Act inflicts a punishment à priori, before the debtor is found guilty of any crime, and tries him afterwards; a system of jurisprudence only tolerated and reconciled to the mind of men by a blind and absurd custom. A He who studies men in private life in detail, needs only to apply his knowledge to society, and on this subject he is qualified to assist in making laws. Treat a menial as a rogue, and how long will he remain honest? If for no other reason, from sheer revenge and spite, he will rob you; and those deserve such treatment who act thus unjustly. Yet this is what our law does involving the innocent and guilty in one fate, thereby making it a man's interest to be a villain, when, if you trust his integrity, will he not help himself? Another palpable error in our law of debtor and creditor is the preposterous anomaly of making a complainant or prosecutor a judge in his own case; the absurdity and mischievous effects of this are seen every day. I never yet met with a creditor (and I have conferred with some thousands) who was not, according to his own account, the most injured of men in every particular case, while the debtor was always U U the greatest scoundrel upon earth; and this feeling is universal, even when the same debtors and creditors in the ups and downs in life change sides-instances of which are not of uncommon occurrence, well known in the experience of that class of men called compromising accountants, who of all men are the best qualified to inform government on the pernicious effects of imprisonment for debt. In the multifarious transactions of men, that which is seen and open to the view of all the world forms but a small part of the knowledge of mankind. Active life is the school for information; but we must pay the fee: man must be both an actor and a spectator in it to know any thing of it correctly. We cannot, however, choose our own parts in the drama, and therefore have not all the same knowledge. The composition accountant exists entirely among embarrassed men, is acquainted with the affairs on both sides of the question as they pass through his hands; and is informed of particulars connected with debtor and creditorship unknown to other men who move out of the stormy sea of life. Being brought every day in collision with the opposite parties, he acquires knowledge on that head to a point of exactitude not attainable by other men; he probes to the bottom their motives, actions, and feelings, by which he can form a tolerably correct estimate of the quantum of honesty to be found on both sides, and can average the amount of reservation of property made by debtors for the support of their families, and to clear their way through imprisonment when driven to that alternative. He can also inform us what sums of money have been lost to creditors, and squandered by debtors, while negotiating with a few obdurate and obstinate individuals, whose ignorance, cupidity, and desire to overreach their fellow-creditors, impels them to resist every offer for a compromise of their claims upon an unfortunate or a roguish and improvident culpable debtor; rejecting the prudent and experienced worthy tradesman's maxim," that in all cases of failure the first offer is never exceeded." These accountants, too, can give us some account of the number of families they have, through the powers invested in a creditor, seen hurled from their station, deprived of their castes, and plunged unnecessarily into want and misery; also the number of inoffensive working industrious men who have, under feelings of desperation, by the prospects of a prison, been suddenly converted first into idlers and ultimately into criminals. Let those who are cast in the mould of theory commit their vain notions to the winds, and remodel their opinions upon facts of this nature. A cabinet council would act wisely in sparing a few days out of their meetings which are consumed in calculations upon the balance of power among nations, and inquire into these matters of internal polity-subjects of interest coming home immediately to every man's door. If the facts connected with imprisonment for debt had been sufficiently considered by our rulers, it could not have escaped their observation, that all years remarkable for the increase of pauperism and crime have been preceded by years of an increased number imprisoned for debt; proving, beyond controversy, that, to a certain extent, the one is occasioned by the other. Our present law makes all debtors, without distinction, criminals ; but leaves the measure of punishment in the hands of those supposed to be aggrieved or injured. Now, when it is considered that some men are comparatively wise, some fools, many full of faults, foibles, and frailties; that some are hard of heart, and others tenderly alive to the Christian charities of nature; that some are of a forgiving and generous disposition, while a large portion of mankind are mean, rancorous, and vindictive, the folly and injustice of constituting men judges in their own case must at once be apparent. All communities contain, indeed all society necessarily implies, a mixture of good and ill; hence the necessity of laws; but in no case, excepting only in the creditor, are all men legally authorised to sit in judgment. Many, too, who are in all matters considered worthy characters, do not allow themselves time to reflect upon the consequences of placing a debtor at the mercy of an unfeeling, mercenary, cool-hearted attorney; but look upon a writ as a talisman, and an attorney as an alchymist, whose crucible never fails to convert stamped paper into gold hence many men, for lack of reflection and a little calculation, commit the greatest enormities, and ruin whole families possessed of virtue and honesty. When the mock election was going on in the King's Bench prison, of which Haydon made a picture, afterwards sold to his late majesty, George IV., for 500l., a gentleman of my acquaintance, who had never been in the place, was, from the noise it occasioned, induced to go in and witness the sports. Never having had throughout his life any intention of imprisoning a person for debt, although he had occasionally employed an attorney, he was surprised to behold among the most lively in the amusements an individual who on inquiry he learnt was there at his own suit. "If," said he," this be the punishment for debt, I'll have none of it;" and forthwith went into the Marshal's office, and left orders for his discharge. Subsequently he had to pay an attorney's bill of costs, amounting to upwards of 201.; and, further, hearing that the debtor's family were in distress in consequence of his imprisonment, he was induced to give them 107. to appease his conscience for having armed the man of law with the power of doing so much mischief. In another case, a gentleman leaving town left in his attorney's hands an acceptance for 15l., intending that he should merely have it presented when due. On this the attorney (without the knowledge of the gentleman) sued, and from time to time squeezed out of the unfortunate debtor, by instalments, 38., still leaving the 15l. due; for which he was ultimately taken to prison, and compelled to take the benefit of the act: all which time the creditor was ignorant of any of the proceedings, and would at any stage of them rather have given the unfortunate man another 157., had he known his case. The debtor in this case was many times taken in execution, and each time paid what he could raise, and gave a fresh warrant of attorney for the residue; so that this man, with a family of seven children, was ruined by law expenses, which went into the pocket of one who deserves a punishment commensurate with the heaviest of crimes. Again other creditors are not only vindictive, but cruel, and evince a baseness of conduct sufficient to rouse the most passively disposed debtor into measures of retaliation. Under the act for the relief of insolvent debtors, every person who petitions the court must at the time be in actual custody within the walls of the prison, and there remain up to the day appointed for his hearing before the commissioners. Spiteful creditors, aware of this, will, after their debtor has been incarcerated for three or four months, the day prior to their being called up to court, send down their discharge, and pay the fees for their liberation ; by which manœuvre the unfortunate debtor is set at large, only to be rearrested by another creditor, and begin de novo proceedings in the Insolvent Debtors' Court, which occasions him four months' further imprisonment; or, if not again immediately arrested, deprives him of that benefit the law designed after a certain period of imprisonment. This trick sometimes cuts both ways; it perverts the law to the worst of purposes, sometimes favouring the escape of guilty, as well as inflicting a double punishment upon the innocent. One instance will suffice to illustrate this. A licensed victualler, who had petitioned the court, was confined in the King's Bench prison at the suit of an eminent brewer. The nature of the prisoner's case was such, that he made no secret of telling his fellow-prisoners he expected a remand for at least two or three years; and the better to prepare some funds for the emergency, he had already commenced tape-selling (vending gin *); for which violation of the prison rules he had been, a few days prior to the one appointed for his going up to court, confined in the strong-room, the only punishment the marshal can avail himself of to inflict while the prisoner is in custody for debt. The man one day, when in this place, was told that he was discharged; but, on learning that his fees were not paid, refused to go, and was in due This is a very common practice in our prisons, although the penalty is ten pounds, or three months' imprisonment, for those who are detected in conveying it in. It is usually introduced by females, contained in long bladders; and the difficulty of detection is so great, that, without committing the grossest indecencies, they cannot be detected. The enormous profit, too, gained upon the sale of it, acts as an inducement to run any risk. Gin is sold, after being well watered, in prisons for threepence a very small glass-one-third less than the common dram glasses. |