Compare these facts with the preposterous statements which the latest orator of the league, Mr M. Crichton, has been repeating to listening zanies at Greenock, Glasgow, and Edinburgh, that "the commitments arising from game laws amount to ONE-FOURTH of the whole crime of the country."
[11] Return of game-law offences during the years 1843-7
| | | | | | | |Counties. | 1843. | 1844. | 1845. | 1846. | 1847. | | +-------+--------+--------+--------+--------+ |Berwick, | 14 | 8 | 14 | 10 | 16 | |Edinburgh, | 41 | 48 | 21 | 12 | 14 | |Haddington, | 35 | 55 | 23 | 33 | 33 | |Fife, | 30 | 25 | 19 | 13 | 6 | | +-------+--------+--------+--------+--------+ | Total, | 120 | 136 | 77 | 68 | 69 |
[12] Evidence, Part i. 1414; ii. 7647, 7651.
At the lower extremity of that ancient street long recognised as the head and centre of the _Pays Latin_ or scholastic quarter of Paris, and which, for six centuries, has borne the name of the _Rue de la Harpe_, within a few doors of the bridge of _St Michel_, and in a room upon the fifth floor, two young men were seated, on a spring morning of the year 182-. Even had the modest apartment been situated elsewhere than in the focus of the students' district, its appearance would have prevented the possibility of mistake as to the character of its inmates. Scanty furniture, considerably battered, caricatures of student life, partially veiling the dirty damp-stained paper that blistered upon the walls, which were also adorned by a pair of foils, a cracked guitar, and a set of castanets; a row of pegs supporting pipes, empty bottles in one corner, ponderous octavos thickly coated with dust in another, told a tale confirmed by the exterior of the occupants of the apartment. One of these, a young man of two-and-twenty, was evidently at home, for his feet were thrust into slippers, once embroidered, a Greek cap covered his head, and a tattered dressing-gown of pristine magnificence enveloped his slender and active figure. His features were regular and intelligent, and he had the dark fiery eyes, clustering black hair, and precociously abundant beard of a native of southern France. His companion, a young Norman, had nothing particularly noticeable in his countenance, save a broad open brow and a character of much shrewdness and perspicacity--qualities possessed in a high degree by a majority of his fellow provincials. His dress was one of those nondescript eccentric coats and conical broad-leafed hats at all times particularly affected by French _studiosi_.