much resembling a sack; another assault case arising out of the fact that Mrs Stocktle had called Mrs Stivvison, spelt Stockton and Stevenson, with the result that their lawful protectors had been dragged into the quarrel, and Jack Stivvison had leathered Jem Stocktle.
Upon these urgent cases the bench of magistrates, consisting of the Rev. Eli Mallow, chairman, the Rev. Arthur Smith, Sir Joshua St. Henry, and the Revds. Thomas Hampson, James Lawrence Barton, and Onesimus Leytonsby, solemnly adjudicated.
Then came the important case of the day; two men, who gave the names of Robert Thorns and Jock Morrison, were placed at the table.
The first was a miserable, dirty-looking object, who seemed to have made a vow somewhere or another never to wash, shave, or sleep in anything but hay and straw, some of which was sticking still in his tangled hair; the other was a different breed of rough.
Rough, certainly, a spectator who had judged the two idlers would have said; but he was decidedly a country rough, and did not belong to town. His big, burly look and length of limb indicated a man of giant strength; at least six feet high, his chest was deep and broad, and in his brown, half gipsy-looking face, liberally clothed with the darkest of dark-brown beards, there shone a pair of fierce dark eyes. Scraped and sand-papered down, and clothed in brown velveteen, with cord trousers and brown leather gaiters, he would have made a gamekeeper of whose appearance any country magnate might have been proud. As it was, his appearance before the country bench of magistrates was enough to condemn him for poaching.
There was something of the keeper, too, in his appearance, for he had on a well-worn velveteen coat and low soft hat, but his big, soft hands told the tale of what he was a neer-do-well, who looked upon life as a career in which no man was bound to work.
Such was Jock Morrison.
The case was plain against them, and they knew that they would have to suffer, for Jock was pretty well known for these affairs. Upon former occasions his brother Tom, the wheelwright, had paid guineas to Mr Ridley, the Lawford attorney, to defend him, but there were bounds to brotherly help.
I cant do it for ever, Tom Morrison had said to his young wife. Ive give Jock every chance I could; now he must take care of himself.
Big Jock Morrison looked perfectly able to do that, as he now stood with his hands in his pockets, staring about him in a cool defiant way. It seemed that he had been warned off Lord Artingales ground several times, but had been too cunning for the keepers, and had only been taken red-handed the previous day, very early in the morning, so evidence showed; and he and his companion had upon them a hare, a rabbit, and a couple of pheasants, beside some wire snares and a little rusty single-barrelled gun, whose barrel unscrewed into two pieces, and which, so the head-keeper deposed, was detached from the stock and stowed away in the inner pocket of the big prisoners coat.
Gun, powder-flask, tin measure, and bag of shot, with game, placed upon the table.
And what did the prisoners say when you came upon them by where did you say, keeper? said one magistrate.
Runby Spinney, Sir Joshua, just where the Greenhurst lane crosses the long coppice, Sir Joshua.
And what did the prisoners say? said the chairman stiffly.
Said they was blackberrying, Sir.
Oh! said the chairman, and he appeared so stern that no one dared laugh, though a young rustic-looking policeman at whom Jock Morrison winked turned red in the face with his efforts to prevent an explosion.
Did they make any er er resistance, keeper? said the chairman.
The big prisoner, sir, said hed smash my head if I interfered with him.
Dear me! A very desperate character, said Sir Joshua. And did he?
No, Sir Joshua, we was too many for him. There was me, Smith, Duggan, and the two pleecemen, so they give in.
And so on, and so on.
Had the prisoners anything to say in their defence?
The dirty man had not, Jock Morrison had. Lookye here: he didnt take the game, shouldnt ha taken it, only they foun em all lying aside the road. It was a fakement o the keepers, thats what it was. They was a pickin blackberries, thats what him and his mate was a doin of, and as soon as the ops was ready they was a going down south to pick ops.
The magistrates clerk, the principal solicitor in the town, smiled, and said he was afraid they would miss the hop-picking that season, as it was over.
There was a short conference on the bench, and then the Rev. Eli Mallow sentenced the prisoners to three months imprisonment, and told them it was very
fortunate for them that they had not resisted the law.
You arnt going to quod us for three months along o them birds and that hare, are you? said Jock Morrison.
Take them away, policeman.
Hold hard a moment, said the big fellow, so fiercely that the sergeant present drew back. Look here, parsons, youll spoil our hop-picking.
Take them away, constable, said the Rev. Eli. The next case.