Genteel Mendicants.

measure , discredited . It has already done much to expose the crowd of hungry needy beggars , who will starve rather than work ; but , as far as we can judge , it has done little to repress that vast mass of genteel mendicity which finds a home in a great city like London . We are not speaking

of the professional begging letter writers , or of the rogue , of gentlemanlike manners , who has seen better days . These harpies , without character , having been through the gamut of villainy , must , sooner or later , come within the clutches of the law . By genteel mendicants we mean

those persons who , with characters apparently unspotted , make begging a profession . We are thinking of the widows of clergymen and schoolmasters , who imagine all the world is bound to help them . Of the needy half pay officers and their wives , who , in obscure country towns , beg

credit of poor little tradesmen , and never pay until they are compelled ; who run bills with the butcher , and turn up their noses when they meet him in the streets . We are , in short , thinking of people who are capable of any dirty or mean action which will save them from the necessity of

working for their bread . Here , for example , is a genteel beggar , who has been the round of half the genteel charities in the metropolis , and she finds the game a paying one . She is a lady of " irreproachable character . " Her husband was a clergyman , and during his long career he never

obtained a larger stipend than £ 120 per annum . She is the sister of a colonial bishop , one of those poor and much despised preachers of the Word , who , when they do visit our shores , appear to be in a state of perpetual wonder at the magnificence of their own gaiters and aprons . Our

heroine learned the trade of a genteel beggar whilst she and her family were starving on a pittance of £ 80 per annum . Like very many of the educated , and so-called refined classes , she is utterly devoid of fine feeling . A poor charwoman would blush for shame to be caught importuning

the mistress of the house for a few cast-off clothes , but our fine lady , who can rattle off a symphony of Beethoven and speak French with the accent of a Parisian , has no such mauvaise honte . When she , or rather her husband , was curate of Dunder-cum-Puddenhead , she had managed to

make her woes known to all the grand people in the neighbourhood . She had always some bill to meet , or the brokers to pay out of the house , or a baker ' s bill to settle ; and if cash came in but slowly to her urgent and masculine appeals , she was quite ready to accept payment in kind .

When her husband obtained a better post , far away in the north of England , she canvassed her friends , and actually contrived to raise enough money to pay second class fare for the family . Of course she could not ride in the third class . She , a clergyman ' s wife , and sister of a " colonial , "

could not think of " pigging —that was her refined way of putting it—with artisans and labourers , in those horrid carriages , which railway companies provide for the common herd , who pay their way with hard earned money . She had to think of her girls , whose morals might be

contaminated by the " creatures " who might chance to be their fellow travellers . She had to think of her own dignity , as the wife of the new curate of Slocum Podger , and so the family travelled second class , on charity . Her boys were educated at charitable institutions , and grew up to

manhood with the fixed impressions that they would never be compelled to sully their genteel fingers by hard work , but that light and agreeable employment would be found for them by the good people who had so kindly provided

mamma with ways and means . Our enterprising heroine was in active treaty with certain powerful friends , who had half promised to help the lads in their first battle with the world , when her husband unfortunately died ; and his widow was now enabled to throw in her weeds as an

invaluable portion of the stock m trade of the genteel mendicant . Letters were written to all and singular who might be interested in so charming a family circle . The bishop of the diocese was dunned ; the clergy were importuned for help , the Poor Clergy Relief Society heard

of her misfortunes ; and the ground having been thus carefully prepared the crop of alms began to come in . A subscription , amounting to a respectable sum , was invested for her benefit . The Poor Clergy Relief Society sent her , from time to time , large boxes of cast-off clothing . The

best of these articles , and some of them were really excellent , were at once sold for ready cash , and the charming widow , who , during her husband ' s lifetime , had never known what prosperity was ., now found herself on the high road to that agreeable goal . She discreetly made the metropolis her head quarters , and plenty

Genteel Mendicants.

reigned at her table . Her benevolent friends had kindly paid all her debts , but it was impossible for a lady who all her life had had her leisure enlivened by duns to avoid getting on the wrong side of the tradesman ' s ledger . Fresh liabilities were immediately incurred , and the family rioted in plenty ,

while the begging epistles were daily going out to excite the compassion of the charitable . Nothing came amiss to this bold veteran mendicant ; her husband , in his early days , had become a freeman of a City Company , and this body was importuned for cash , and not , we are sorry to say ,

in vain . A place in the Civil Service was found for the eldest son , and the other was taken into the counting house of a soft-hearted merchant , who was overcome by the vivid picture of the colonial bishop which his mother conjured up before his pitying eyes . The lad , it is true , in spite of his

educational advantages , could not spell , or cast up a column of figures , but our merchant , a big parvenu , pleased himself with the idea that a lad with high connections was grinding in his commercialmill . Our widowtried desperately to get

up a flirtation between her daughter , a girl gifted with red hair and an enormous appetite , and the son of an old college chum of her husband , but the affair came to grief , and the charming young lady left the parental nest to take charge of the education of the children of a friend . Thus far all

had gone swimmingly with our heroine , she had indeed made strenuous efforts to change her own condition , but a widow devoid of personal charms , and encumbered with seven children , is heavily weighted in the matrimonial race . With responsibilities lightened , a certain but small

income , and such help as her boys could afford , she should at least have found it possible to make both ends meet ; but some people , as the Frenchman remarked , are never happy unless they are miserable , and at this moment she is working all the charitable agencies in the metropolis with a view of

lightening in some measure her vast load of debt . We are of opinion that such persons as the widow of the brazen face and resolute heart should be summarily suppressed . It is scandalous that such a person should be permitted to trade upon charity , and make a good thing of the

calling . We are happy to know that our Masonic charities are not so shamefully abused as some that we could name The brotherhood have indeed made it impossible for an adventuress such as the lady we havesketched toliveuponthe

charity of the Order , but if the husband of our heroine had been a Mason she certainly would have tried her arts upon the directing spirits of Grand Lodge . One contribution she might have obtained , but she certainly would not have received a second .

Plagiarism.

PLAGIARISM .

OUR readers must remember that among the games of their boyhood one appropriately known as " Follow my leader . " The boy selected as leader usually possessed , in a pre-eminent degree , the qualities of skill and courage , combined with a certain amount of humour and fertilit y of expedient , judgment , of course , being necessary in the

exercise of these qualities . For instance , the leader having first gauged , or already knowing , perhaps , the powers of those who were to follow him , would hardly attempt or do what it was impossible for them to repeat . His feats must be pretty well within the limits of their ability , or

the game would resolve itself into leading only , without the followers . Now this following a leader is one of those boyish things , which as men , we do not cast aside , only what was done for pastime in our boyhood is become a business or a duty in our manhood . Some one marks out

for himself a particular line of conduct , others , from a variety of motives , think it their duty , or make it their business to adopt such line of conduct for themselves . Some one originates a new system of ethics , or he inaugurates a new theory respecting the planetary system , or he invents a

patent ; immediately there is a goodly number of people who adopt his views or follow in his footsteps . Others again denounce these systems and theories , and invent counter systems and theories of their own . These , too , find a multitude of followers . All this is natural enough , and , in the

main , proper . Yet is there one kind of lead the following of which is generally reprehended . We mean that adoption or imitation of ideas which is known in journalism , and generally throughout the world of literature as plagiarism . One man racks his brains with a view to writing a book . The book is written , and then , forthwith , some one else