Punch (59.1870)

July 9, 1870.] PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI. 13

BOBBY NOT ON HIS BEAT. A CASE OF GREEK CONSCIENCE.

A Brigand lately executed in Greece wrote a letter of dying: wishes
to his brother. From a translation of this document, originally pub-
lished in the Phos, the writer appears to have been brought to some
sense of his situation. As thus :—

" Brother Nicolaki, I salute you. My brother, I enjoin you to give 50
drachmas to the church of St. Paraskeyi, in the village of Limogarthi; also
to St. John of Palcochori 30 drachmas ; give a gallon of oil to the church of
Neochori, and a gallon of oil to St. Nicholas of Divri. Give a gallon of oil to
the Virgin of Xeriotissa, and when you return to our native place give to the
poor all you choose for the salvation of my soul."

These injunctions are not followed by reference to any fund out of
which the expense of executing them was to be defrayed, except the
following:—

" Do what you like with the cows that I have at Divri.'

It may be surmised that this legacy was hardly considerable enough
to meet the charges of fulfilling the pious intentions above specified,
and sundry others whereof the detail follows :—

" Make a garland, write my name upon it, and with it crown the head of
I St. Nicholas in our church. Do not quarrel on account of the disputed cattle
I with Yannaka Founta, or else his curse will follow me, hut take for settlement
what he chooses to give you."

| Besides practising moderation and forbearance by posthumous proxy,
he proposes likewise to perform expiation :—

" "When I was a lad I robbed from the church the holy books ofFatheh
Veta, and he cursed me ; therefore, you must find a priest, and bring him to
my grave to bless it, otherwise I am afraid that my body will not be changed."

This clerk of St. Nicholas—a saint to whom, by the way, it may have

I been noticed that he bequeathed a special offering out of his brother's

^™^r, ,r w,„™; ™ ; i„ f i j u j. 4.1 i pocket—had, in his education, evidently erijoyed religious teaching, of
ednesday mornin?, in astweek, and between the f l? ■ •., r n i u a u • „ a

i p n „. <J ,„ +i- a- * u j " a sort, combined with secular. However he had been impressed with

t"let;e, benf tLtf^lS fW f ^ ***** » * — ~« * *> «* °'

window-shutters of a watchmaker's shop in Cheap- s ro er '
side, and cut a disc of glass out of one of the panes. " If you do not intend to return to our birthplace, take care of my child and
They had just hooked out a chain, which, unfortunately for the daring treat mm as your own ! and execute faithfully all that I command you.here."
and ingenious fellows, had dropped between the shutters and the TT . ,., ,,. ,. c , . . u

window, when their noise aroused the watchman in charge of the pre- He recogmsed the obligation of almsgiving; by the same means :-
mises, and caused that Argus to raise an alarm, which put them " When you meet ragged beggars, receive them, and assist them as much
to flight in safety. These particulars are gathered from a newspaper, as you can, otherwise God will not permit the salvation of my soul."
which mentions, besides the watchmaker's name. That is omitted j Q facU uliumfacit per se was bis economical maxim applied to
here, because the possibility that Punch could publish, or be let in to ! ^ Tu ^ necessary, in his view, but could be done by

copy, a covert advertisement, must not even be suspected But, of § t He \k brother ^ f attor' to be cbaritabie to
course the operators who trepanned Mb. Hyphen s window were : tfa£ * &J t himgeJf al PHad that broth however, been a
genuine thieves 1 hen this is the second operation on plate-glass which ' £t st'ranger and had he met him in a mountain pass near Marathon,
artists of that denomination have been able to take their time m per- £ th hl° hway couJd be huve more coolly charged him with any
forming, since the other day, in the midst of a chief City thoroughfare commission &an £th one such as this ._

How can these facts be accounted lor, except on the supposition that j
there are tares in the City Police corn ? Can that generally fine and " I left my watch with Mr. Rizoli-Manolt. Go to him and give 28

trusty body of men contain any members of the dangerous classes who
have crept into it in disguise ? Is it possible that the civic authorities
have set thieves to catch thieves unwittingly, and not according to the

drachmas. Sell your own and take mine as a keepsake."

Doubtless this remarkable specimen of a penitent thief regarded his
own particular brother only with a higher degree of the same fraternal

proverb ? Was the leisurely perforation of windows in Fleet Street affection as that which he had always cherished for Ms brother man; for
and Cheapside practicable by connivance of accomplices m ^blue ? I mankind at large. He subsisted bv putting his hands into their

pockets during life, and he thought to buy salvation by putting them
after death into his brother's.

Most people have seen the photographs of certain lately executed
Greek brigands' heads in the picture-shop windows. Nothing, one

These questions will perhaps engage the attention of the Lord Mayor
and Aldermen. There is something so rotten in the state of their
police arrangements, that if scientific housebreaking continues to be
practised in open gaslight within their boundaries, people will soon

begin to say that the Mansion House is as bad as the Home Office. wouid can be more probab!e than that one of those heads

belonged to the subject of the preceding remarks

The Drought and the Jolly Farmers.

Homegreen {on top of hill shouting over intervening valley to Hawfinch Just Wort h Mentioning.

on hill opposite). How all the countree's burnt up along o' this here j The Saturday Review advises Mr. James Grant (of the
drought ! | Advertiser) to do what another gentleman did a great many years ago

Hawfinch. Ees. The land everywhere now about I calls the same " ^ the case of Punch." That is, to retire from a periodical because it
stuff as the leases on't. assailed the Pope. We do not know whether Mr. Grant (ultra-

Homegreen. As how? Protestant) would think such a cause sufficient to justify the course

Hawfinch. Parchmunt. suggested ; but that is his affair. Ours is, to express no sham regret

' that the Saturday Review permits either ignorance or spite to blotch its

greatly galled. pages, which do habitual service to literature and to morals.

The other day a well-known Economist was found by his friends m 1

tears. Asked the cause, he pointed to the return obtained by Mr. I new translation.
Crawfobd, showing the cost of writing fluid in our public offices, 1 w k f Horace's first Satire what the fashionable Roman
and said emphatically-^^ i*<s lachrym* ! tailor said To M ecenas, when he came and tried on his new toga-
-" I " Qui fit, Maecenas "—" How does it fit, Maecenas ? "

fore and aft.

Who designed the new helmet for our police ? Whoever it was, he Advice to Parliamentary Oratobs.—Keep your breath to cool
must have done it in a fit of pique. your turtle.