THE VIRTUOUS VILLAGE.

Evening Star, Issue 14036, 17 April 1909, Page 11

THE VIRTUOUS VILLAGE.

CONSCIENTIOUS POLICEMAN DECLINES OFFICE. A YEAR OF ENFORCED IDLENESS. What other village can dispute with Fenny Drayton, in Leicestershire, the claim to be the most virtuous and lawabiding community in the land? At a parish meeting on March 4, for the purpose of appointing a parish constable for the ensuing year, Mr William Wale, the retiring constable, who had been recommended by the committee of selection for. reappointment, declined the offer, on the ground that the “ persistent honesty, sobriety, and good conduct of the population of the parish gave no opportunity nor encouragement to a conscientious police officer.”

During the whole of his year of office, Mr Wale complained that' not a single offence of any kind had been committed in the parish, and by his observation and knowledge he was forced reluctantly to the conclusion that in the twelve months ensuing, or, for the matter of that, as far ahead as the imagination could travel, no offence of any kind necessitating the intervention of the guardian of the peace was likely to he committed. He was discouraged and disappointed. He had done his best by the parish. But the parish had failed to respond. If it had provided him during the year with one single prisoner to arrest and prosecute, he would have taken it as evidence of good faith and an earnest for the future, and would have continued to serve. But things being as they were, he felt it only due to his own dignity to retire. The official insignia and instruments of his authority—the parish truncheon and a pair of steel handcuffs—had hung idle upon the wall over the kitchen fire-place throughout the year. He had given unremitting personal attention to business, hoping nom month to month that some opportunity of service would arise, but no business had come, and he felt now that there was nothing for it but to withdraw, and seek in the’ occupation or agricultural lahoier a career of usefulness which was denied to the professional thief-taker by the social conditions of Fenny Drayton. The parish meeting, while thanking Mr Wale for ms past sendees and congratulating him upon the admirable order maintoned in the parish during his term of omce ; could not but sympathise with mm m his disappointment, and regretfully accepted his withdrawal. A hopeful young villager, Mr Thomas Cooper, had also been recommended for the office, and he, being one of those sangmue-souled enthusiasts whom no hopeless prospects dismay, consented to accept it for a twelvemonth, and took over the truncheon and handcuffs, ms fellow parishioners assuring him of their good-will and their best wishes tor his success.

The village of Fenny Drayton lies about three miles from Nuneaton, in the rich cheesemaking country ot the Atherstone Hunt. With the S^r d l n S parish it has a population ; rhere , l3 no public-house in the village, but there is an old coaching inn on the border of the parish, by the side of \\atlmg street. Tramps pass along this great thoroughfare in the summer time without any visible means bsistence, tut they never branch off to hj enny Drayton. Motor cars may frequently be seen passing along the great highway exceeding the speed limit, but unfortunately the parish constable can only stand.by and look smpoteutly on, for the highway is outside his iurisdiciioji,—London ‘Mail’-