The Tables Turned Part 3

_Pot_. Yes; for I got into conversation with one of them, who told me that it meant the brain, the skull.

_J. N_. (_writing_). "The rent of ability is a cant phrase in use among these people signifying the head."

_Mr. H_. Well?

_Pot_. Well, then they laughed and said, Well, as far as he is concerned, smash it when you can catch it.

_Mr. H_. Did you gather whose head it was that they were speaking of?

_Pot_. Yes; his lords.h.i.+p's.

_Mr. H_. (_impressively and plaintively_). And _why_?

_Pot_. Because they said he had jugged their comrades like a d.a.m.ned old smoutch!

_J. N_. _Jugged_?

_Pot_. Put them in prison, my lord.

_J. N_. (_Aside_: That Norwich affair.) Wait! I must write my self down a smoutch--smoutch? no doubt a foreign word.

_Mr. H_. What else have you heard the prisoner say.

_Pot_. I have heard him threaten to make her Majesty the Queen take in was.h.i.+ng.

_J. N_. Plain was.h.i.+ng?

_Pot_. Yes, my lord.

_J. N_. Not fancy work?

_Pot_. No, my lord.

_A Juryman_. Have you heard him suggest any means of doing all this?

_Pot_. Yes, sir; for I have attended meetings of his a.s.sociation in disguise, when they were plotting means of exciting the populace.

_Mr. H_. In which he took part?

_Pot_. In which he took part.

_Mr. H_. You heard him arranging with others for a rising of the lower orders?

_Pot_. Yes, sir; and on the occasion, when I met him in the public house, I got into conversation with him, and he told me that his society numbered upwards of two millions. (J. F. _grins_.)

_The Juryman_ (_anxiously_). Armed?

_Pot_. He said there were arms in readiness for them.

_Mr. H_. Did you find out where?

_Pot_. Yes; at the premises of the Federationist League, 13 Farringdon Road.

_Mr. H_. Did you search for them there?

_Pot_. Yes.

_Mr. H_. Did you find them?

_Pot_. No; we found nothing but printing-stock and some very shabby furniture, and the office-boy, and three compositors.

_Mr. H_. Did you arrest them?

_Pot_. No; we thought it better not to do so.

_Mr. H_. Did they oppose your search?

_Pot_. No.

_Mr. H_. What did they do?

_Pot_. Well, they took grinders at me and said, "Sold!"

_Mr. H_. Meaning, doubtless, that they had had an inkling of your search and had sold the arms?

_Pot_. So we gathered.

_J. N_. (_writing_). "They did not find the arms because they had been sold."

_Mr. H_. Well, Constable, that will do.

_J. N_. Prisoner, do you wish to ask the Constable any questions?

_J. F_. Well, I don't know. I strongly suspect that you have made up your mind which way the jury shall make up their minds, so it isn't much use. However, I will ask him three questions. Constable Potlegoff, at how many do you estimate the dense crowd at Beadon Road, when I obstructed?

_Pot_. Upwards of a thousand.

_J. F_. H'm; a good meeting! How many were present at that meeting of the Socialist League where we were plotting to make the Queen take in was.h.i.+ng?

_Pot_. Upwards of two hundred.

_J. F_. Lastly, when I told you in the public-house that we were two millions strong, were you drunk or sober?

_Pot_. Sober.

_J. F_. H'm! It's a matter of opinion perhaps as to when a man _is_ drunk. Was I sober?

_Pot_. No; drunk.