PEEPS INTO COURT.

Waimate Daily Advertiser, Volume XXIV, 9 April 1927, Page 2

PEEPS INTO COURT.

THE SEAMY SIDE.*

(By

R. E. Corder).

A bag o’ tricks was opened before Mr Watson, the magistrate at North London Police Court recently.

First came James the costermonger, who finding trade dull, tried the game of “ringing the changes’’ on a tobacconist who had cut his first cigar, and was, therefore, no intent in his business.

Now, this game of “ringing the changes” is not so easy as it sounds in a police court. I have seen mathematicians working out the trick to seven places of decimals. I

Scores of tradesmen have been robbed, especially in the North London area, by this ingenious trick, which is really based on simple arithmetic. 4 well-dressed genial customer asks for three 8d cigars, for which he tenders a 10s note. The assistant gives him the cigars and 8s change.

“Bother,” says the customer. “I have plenty of silver-to pay for the cigars; give me the pote back.”

The attendant politely returns the note, and the customer putting down a 10s note and 10s in silver, says: "Give me £1 and we are straight.” The transaction looks correct, and the customer gets away with 10s before the attendant realises that he has been done. Really it is very simple. The customer comes in with 12s and goes away with £1 and the cigars. ■lames the chstermonger, who pleaded guilty, was remanded for sentence.

Away in the sporting ’eighties a clubman stood on London Bridge, and to decide a bet offered real sovereigns at twopence each. His theory, which experience proved to be correct, was that the British public was suspicious rather than credulous. and he did not sell his sovereigns.

Obviously his sporting offer has been copied, anil the last imitator is Cyril the tipster, who stood in an open market place at Kingsland Waste and offered sovereigns for Is each.

Cyril owes an apology to his tailor. He wore wide trousers covering spats over brown boots. He wore gloves, but they did not excuse a pink handkerchief and an artificial red flower in his buttonhole. Among the large audience attracted by Cyril only one youth admitted that ho expected to receive £1 for Is, and as he did not appear, the magistrate and the defending solicitor exchanged pertinent remarks about his intelligence, and Cyril the tipster was discharged. Personally, I thought that the pink handkerchief, the spats, and the brown boots ought to have earned at least a minor penalty. A man who can wear white spats, with brown boots is—well, it isn’t done 1 Next we turned to young Ernest, described as a pianoforte assistant, who ought to have been charged with having artificially waved hair. But as many of our young constables are guilty of the same offence, Ernest, on this indictment can be let off with a caution. All the same, someth ng has got to be done about this hair-raising business. The more the girls cut off their hair the more our young men seek to enlarge their tresses, 'and the most enterprising pioneers are our young constables, whose permanent waves will soon raise a storm of protest among the old inspectors, who believe that cleanliness is next to godliness, and to whom a close-cropped head means manly distinction. It grieves me to say that at the moment many of our. young constables are so waved and frizzled that they shame the Eton crop of our popular revue girls. But this is getting away from Ernest, who, when arrested, disgorged 38 discs, 28 foreign coins, and 20 packets of cigarettes. Since Emest was captured, attacks on undefended automatic machine® in the North London area have almost ceased, and a detective logically argued that the gang of which Ernest was a member lud been cramped in their style by the arrest of one of their ntimber.Ernest, who did not move a hair, promired that he would never look an automatic machine in the slot again, and as there was nothing against him he was bound over automatically.

This continued the tricky business introduced to Mr Watson, who, however, iiad further trouble. An elderly woman, possessing no particular attraction of fate or form, complained that all the men in her neighbourhood wore following her aliout and insulting her. “Can you give me their names’” inquired the polite but incredulous magistrate.

“No, sir,” replied the indignant woman. “There are too many; and they have east • spell over me.’ “Next, please,” said Mr Watson, wearilv. And the next was a young man a healthy, stalwart young man—who desired a summons against his write for assault, ...

“She hit me over the head and then struck me across the knee with a stick, and I had to go to the hospital, lam afraid of her,” said the young husband. The magistrate granted a summons, and nobody was surprised. The day has gone by when physical attacks were confined to the male sex. “The female of„the species is move deadly than the male.”

After this an attack upon I’.C. 490 N by Charles, the young general dealer, who couldn’t remember, was tame. Chas, who did not look like even a promising feather-weight, wanted to fight, and he chose P.C. 490 N, who is certainly a heavyweight to practise on. P.C. 490 N collected him, wrapped him up, and delivered him, and Mr Watson, who knows al! there is to know about boxing smiled and let Charles off with a 20s fine.

% ’ Robert was labouring through the street in Perkham burdened with 421 b of sheet lead. ■ , i. , 9>> “What are you going to do with that ? inquired a detective. ‘‘Sell it,” replied Robert promptly.

“Where did you get it ? ' “Took it from the roof of an empty house,” said truthful Robert, who, having lost his job as a hotel porter, was handed over to the court missionary, who will help him to regain his previous good character.

\ r „, : n arm with two policemen Ann, > . 0 r.,,A4 » o ride m *''O ambulance, »r--rto«d ‘ "omplmnt’v «t the station. “For bmng drunk ami the ”«• of escoit. 7/6,” ordered ‘he magistrate Maud had a row with another woman over the ownershin of n dev. Ihe oth»r woman got the -W and Maud paid the amount of its license. • • • • • Elizabeth, wearing a green hat and a Hack eye, admitted she had been drunk, but not disorderly, she knew her manners “She was fighting with a man in the Walworth Road, announced a constable. “I told her to go away but twenty minutes later she was fighting with another man.” , “A quarrelsome woman,” remancw the Magistrate, “must pay 20/ ■ ”