MELBOURNE ITEMS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 1511, 1 January 1891, Page 3

MELBOURNE ITEMS.

(from our own correspondent.)

Melbourne avi! 1 soon become an unsatisfactory place to live in unless • lie growing lawlessness of tlie predatory tribes receives a check. One expects to hear of a certain number of burglaries, and picked pockets in crowded places are accepted as ordi* nary occurrences. These incidents are regarded as penalties which people have to pay for being owners of property in the midst of communities in which thieves exist, lout tne depredations I more p i rticalafly refer to are those which come under the lioad of garrotting and highway robbery In broad daylight. It seems strange that a gentleman can he seized, robbed, of a valuable 'watch and money, in the middle of the day, at the turnstile leading to the exhibition building Yet such a thing did happen one clay last week. About the same date three men were driving in a buggy along a public street, in broad clay !i .lit. The Irrso was pulled up near a lady ; two men ■jumped out, wrenched a bag from her hand, and drove off with it. And we know that large sums of money were got off with during the current year in a precisely similar manner.

Now, with vegai'd to gawotting, I am old enough to remember the time when that playful amusement first became common in London. The practice was carried on in crowded streets, and the incidents became so common that the morning upon which the record of one or two such robberies did not appear in tiie newspapers was regarded as an exceptional one. At last. Parliament took tlie matter in hand and passed vr short hill, and a sharp one, that practically put down the scoundrels that lived by the profession. The remedy was imprisonment, with from two to three dozen lashes with a cat o’-nine-tails, well laid on by an experienced hand upon the bate back of the scoundrel who was convicted. Men of this kidney are almost in variably cowardly rascals, who shrink from physical suffering with as much abhorrence as they detest hard woik. Hence the results were most excellent. If onv legislators veil! 'copy the English system, and extend it to wife-beaters as well as garrotters hero, they will do societv, and especially the helpless wives of, brutes, an infinite service. The question might also be fairly

mooted whether the same discipline should not extend to footpads and bag-* snatchers who infest the streets of the city and suburbs. It is monstrous that a woman cannot safely walk by daylight m the crowded streets without danger of being seized and robbed.

Here is what a daily paper has to, say upon the subject, but I Imre is no suggestion as to a deterrent remedy : The attention of the police is now being specially directed to the crime of garrotting, so prevalent at the present time, and while no special instructions have been issued, the constables understand that they are to use the utmost vigilance in connection with the operations of those committing these dangerous robberies. Crimes of the nature indicated have been alarmingly on the increase since the Melbourne Cup race meeting, and one theory advanced by the police is that, owing to the vigorous measures then adopted to repress the operations* of unregistered bookmakers and spielers, the scum of their class failed to reap'the usual harvest, and now in their desperation they have entered upon a career of robbery and daylight assault. It has also been noticed by the police that many df this fraternity whose presence in the city is an undoubted evil, a-e visitors from another colony, and the records at the city watch house show that a considerable number of the arrests made during the past four or live weeks are of Sydney criminals, or at least men known to the police in New South Wales. . . . . With the daylight garrotter the officers of the law have a 'better chance, however, but notwithstanding the extreme danger of their nefarious calling, these thieves have made -themselves frequently known during the past month, and three cases in three days is their present record at the police station. Of these the two most daring are the assault by two men on Mr Walter Irving as he was entering the exhibition gardens about milday on Friday. In this case the victim was so roughly treated that lie could not appear against bis assailants at the City Court on Saturday, but they were remanded to appear at Carlton on Friday next.” Mi Irving is the man I alluded to who was robbed of a watch worth L6O, besides his purse.

One of the recent additions to the literature of Melbourne is “ Massey’s Illustrated, a monthly journal de signed expressly to interest rural homes. It is well got up, and should prove attractive.