Every kind of domestic difficulty is laid before him. An unwelcome but persistent suitor for a daughter haunts the mother’s house; she seeks relief from the magistrate. The father and mother interfere with the course of true love, and a girl of sixteen seeks advice from the magistrate. An ardent lover has made his sweetheart presents, which she refuses to return now that the engagement is ‘off’; he applies to the magistrate. An expected husband does not return home on the Saturday or Sunday; on Monday the wife consults the magistrate.
Lodgers with bad landlords and landlords with bad lodgers consult the magistrate; people with bad neighbours consult the magistrate; the watchful housedog barks at night; the neighbouring cock proclaims too early the dawn; the next door neighbour has a daughter who gives lessons on the piano; a strong-lunged youth practises the cornet on Sunday afternoons--these are some of the smaller troubles laid before the magistrate.
But deep and hopeless sorrows are never wanting; and in despair and perplexity not a few seek comfort from the magistrate. Poor old women, whom no one in the world cares for, and for whom the workhouse waits--a place of which they are mortally afraid--seek help from the magistrate. Rosy-faced young women fresh from the country to some place of service in London, finding their mistresses to be of doubtful character, fly in terror to seek the help of the magistrate. And he sits and listens, and advises. A great organization some years ago in their appeal for funds spoke as if they were the lawyers of the poor. For years, without any appeal, any advertisement, or any reward, the magistrates of London have been and are still the legal advisers of the poor.
The ever-increasing army of the demented ones also apply in their hopeless conditions and with their inexplicable delusions to the magistrate. One is persecuted by the police; another is shadowed by an assassin; another someone is trying to poison. A poor woman wants the telephone-wire removed--‘it talks to her.’ An equally poor man complains of the telegraph. So they come and go away with their scrap of comfort. Much patience, kindness, sympathy, and wisdom do our magistrates exhibit in dealing with those who seek their advice on every conceivable and inconceivable subject.