NARRATIVE OF LAW AND CRIME.

EDMUND FRANCIS HUNT, a plasterer, of Bath, Drowned
himself and an Infant Child on the 2nd. Hunt was
industrious and well-conducted, but his wife wasteful,
drunken, and dishonest: she had several times been
imprisoned for theft. This preyed on the husband's
mind: in autumn last, when she was in gaol, where she
was delivered of a child, he threatened that if she ever
again committed a robbery, he would destroy himself.
On the 2nd she was taken into custody for shoplifting,
and a neighbour informed Hunt of this at night. Hunt,
who had been drinking a little, became excited, and
hastened home. At the inquest, his son deposed: "As
soon as father came home, he asked, 'Where's mother?'
and I told him I did not know. My little sister, who
was up stairs in bed, then called out 'Father!' My
father told me to go up stairs and fetch her. I gave
him my sister, and asked him to come up to bed. He
told me to go up to bed, and said he should not see my
face any more. When in bed I heard my father go out
and shut the back-door. I then heard him say
something to my sister, but I could not understand what it
was. My sister was two-and-a-half years old. She was
my only sister, and my father was particularly fond of
her. He liked her better than all the rest of us, and
often had her brought down stairs to him when he came
home." The river Avon flowed at the back of the
house, and thither he proceeded with his child. Their
bodies have since been found in the stream—the child's
near Bristol. The verdict of the coroner's jury was
"Temporary Insanity."

Two children were Drowned at Exeter on the night
of Saturday, the 2nd. Elizabeth Bradford, the wife of
a joiner, was seen walking towards the ship-basin, with
her three children; some time after, a man heard a
splashing in the water, and he pulled a little boy out of
the basin, still alive; the mother said he must have
fallen in. But it was reported that the two little girls
of the woman were missing; next morning the police
dragged the basin, and the bodies of the children were
found. Elizabeth Bradford was arrested, in a wild and
frantic state. The coroner's jury have returned an
open verdict, to the effect that the children were
"found drowned," but how they came into the water
there was no evidence to show.

At the Surrey Sessions, on the 4th, two women, one
aged twenty, and the other thirteen, were tried for
Stealing a Sheep at Addington, near Croydon. Their
apprehension was mentioned in our last Number. The
evidence clearly made out that they had taken the
sheep from a number of others in a fold, cut and
wrenched its head off, skinned the body, and torn it to
pieces; and were stopped when carrying the meat
away at night. They were both convicted. The woman,
a bad character, was sentenced to ten years' transportation;
the girl, to a year's imprisonment.

George Wild, a policeman of the M Division, was
tried on the 5th for Stealing Rabbit-Skins. Much
interest was excited on account of the antecedents of the
accused: he had been in the police ten years, had held
a high character, and was very active in detecting
crime; through his means thirty persons have been
transported, and more than a hundred summarily
convicted for robbery. Mrs. Sinnetts, a furrier, occupied
some cellars in Southwark as warehouses for skins; it
was suspected that the place was robbed; application
was made to Wild, and he undertook to investigate the
matter. To attempt to catch the thieves, he and one of
Mrs. Sinnett's sons watched at night; and eventually
Wild was left in the place by himself. An air-hole
communicated from one of the cellars with the Cross-
bones burial-ground. The prisoner appears to have
thrust a number of skins through this hole; then he
got admission through a house into the ground, and
took away a bag-full of skins; but as the tenant of the
house suspected and questioned him, he took the bag
and part of the skins to Mrs. Sinnett's son, pretending
that a robber had thrust them into the grave-yard, and
that he had noticed the articles through the railings.
A number of skins were found in a yard near Wild's
lodging, and there was no doubt he threw them there.
The verdict was "Guilty," with a recommendation to
mercy. He was sentenced to six months' imprisonment,
with hard labour.

Thomas Cox, a boy of nine years old, was killed on
the 6th, by Falling into an old Coal-pit. He left home
on the morning with his father to work in a coal-pit,
near Darlaston, in Staffordshire. In passing through
a field, near Potter's Bridge, his hat blew off. The
morning was dark and windy, and whilst in search of it
he fell into an old pit exposed without any fence round
or over it. He was brought up, his head fractured, both
his legs broken, dreadfully crushed, and quite dead.
A public road passes within twenty yards of the pit, and
there is no fence against either the road or the pit, which
is about thirty-five yards deep. There are two or three
other pits near, in an equally dangerous state. The jury
returned a verdict of "Accidental Death;" expressing
an opinion that "there had been great want of proper
attention and care on the part of the occupier of the pit
in question, in not having seen that it was properly
protected."

Mr. W. H. Apperley, a land-agent, was Attacked by
Highwaymen on the 7th. Whilst returning in the
evening from  Abergavenny towards Hereford in his gig
alone, he was stopped by three men in a lonely part of
the road. Perceiving that resistance was useless, and
having a sum of money upon his person, he leaped from
the gig over the fence down into a strip of land adjoining
the river, the field being here many feet below the road;
almost before he regained his feet, he heard the horse
and gig roll over the fence also. He ran for assistance,
and found three men at home in a cottage not three
hundred yards distant, who immediately returned with
him; they found the horse and gig (the latter doubtless
upset in its passage over the fence) near the river. The
highwaymen had followed the gig down the place, and
ransacked the contents; but the only booty they obtained
was a letter-case, and about five or six French coins.
Not the least damage was sustained by either horse, gig,
or harness.

At the Central Criminal Court, on the 8th, Margaret
Higgins and Elizabeth Smith were indicted on a charge
of robbing Mr. Frederick Hardy Jewett, a solicitor, after
having Stupified him with Chloroform. Between nine
and ten o'clock on the evening of Jan. 10th, whilst
proceeding slowly along the Whitechapel Road, he felt
somebody, he believed a woman, touch his left side, and
a rag or handkerchief pressed over the lower part of the
face. He became insensible until the following morning,
when he slowly revived, and found himself lying on a
very dirty bed in a wretched apartment, and in a
complete state of nudity, with the exception of an old piece
of rag which had been carelessly thrown over him.
Some of his clothes were in the room; other articles had
been stolen, with his watch, jewellery, and money. His
trowsers were muddy, as if he had been dragged through
the streets. The door of the room was fastened by a
padlock outside; he found the key on the floor; he
pushed it under the door to a potman who happened to
be in the house, and was thus liberated. He found that
he had been conveyed to a low lodging-house in Thrall
Street, Spitalfields. Policemen and other witnesses gave
evidence. The women rented the room; when arrested,
they accused each other. Higgins had been heard to say
that she had "done" the robbery. She told a woman
that a man named Gallagher, with whom she cohabited,
had undergone an operation at the London Hospital,
where they had given him some stuff to send him to sleep,
and that he had contrived to bring some of it away with
him. The jury returned a verdict of "Guilty," and the
prisoners were sentenced to be transported for fifteen
years. It is doubtful whether the unfortunate gentleman
will ever recover from the effects of the treatment he
suffered.

At the Surrey Sessions, on the 9th, Charlotte Wilson
was indicted for a Similar Offence. Mr. Barnet Lea,
whilst passing St. George's Church, in the Borough, on
the evening of the 1st of January, was accosted by the
prisoner. On telling her to go about her business, she
suddenly passed a handkerchief across his face, and he
became very unwell. Not suspecting any narcotic in the
handkerchief, he ran into a public-house close by, and
called for a glass of brandy; but before he could drink