Twenty Years' Recollections of an Irish Police Magistrate. Frank Thorpe Porter
in several periodicals. I accord to their authors my willing testimony as to their great imaginative power, for in the statements concerning me there is not one word of truth. My friend, Mr. Fitzpatrick, in his recent productions of "The Sham Squire" and "Ireland before the Union," has mentioned me as the source from which he derived the particulars of a few incidents in those interesting works. His unexaggerated correctness forms a strong contrast to the flippant fictions of others. However, when my name is brought before the public, in reference either to fiction or fact, it affords me some apology for appearing in propriâ personâ.
I cannot refrain from subjoining to this preface, with the permission of the writer, a letter which I received soon after the publication of the first edition.
F. T. P.
Dublin Castle,
29th October, 1875.
Dear Mr. Porter,
"I must thank you for the gratification and amusement Lady Burke and I have found in your "Gleanings." The stories are full of interest, and the anecdotes are told with wit, humour, and piquancy. The volume is one of the cleverest books I have read this long time."
Yours very truly,
J. BERNARD BURKE, Ulster.
| CHAPTER I. | |
| PAGE | |
| Lonergan's Case—Old Prisons | 1 |
| CHAPTER II. | |
| Vesey and Keogh | 6 |
| CHAPTER III. | |
| Mary Tudor | 16 |
| CHAPTER IV. | |
| The Birth of a Word—A Letter of Introduction—The Honor of Knighthood | 25 |
| CHAPTER V. | |
| A Millionaire | 31 |
| CHAPTER VI. | |
| The Ship Street Diamond—Second-hand Plate—The Silver Slab—Law's Window—Old Newgate | 33 |
| CHAPTER VII. | |
| Gonne's Watch | 42 |
| CHAPTER VIII. | |
| The Major | 49 |
| CHAPTER IX. | |
| Committals—A Barber Wanted—Dwyer the Rebel—An Extraordinary Inquest—Sergeant Greene's Horse—Christy Hughes—The Police Clerks—Recorder Walker—The Police Statutes—Preamble—A Benefit Society Case—Police Recruits—A Born Soldier | 57 |
| CHAPTER X. | |
| Mendicancy | 71 |
| CHAPTER XI. | |
| Carriage Court Cases—Dublin Carmen | 77 |
| CHAPTER XII. | |
| A Gratuitous Jaunt—The Portuguese Postillion—A Few Hyperboles—Miscellaneous Summonses | 88 |
| CHAPTER XIII. | |
| Dogs—Whipping Young Thieves—Garden Robbers—Reformatories—Apologies for Violence—Trespassers on a Nunnery | 95 |
| CHAPTER XIV. | |
| Terry Driscoll's Fiction—Bridget Laffan—Sailors—Fisher | 103 |
| CHAPTER XV. | |
| A Duper Duped | 110 |
| CHAPTER XVI. | |
| Who threw the Bottle?—Excise and Customs Cases | 119 |
| CHAPTER XVII. | |
| John Sergeant—The Magisterial Offices—Two Murders—One Reprieved—Delahunt's Crimes | 127 |
| CHAPTER XVIII. | |
| Murder of Mr. Little—Detective Inefficiency—Individual Efficiency—A False Accusation Exposed—Extraordinary Gratitude—A Salutary Reformation—A Charge of Felony—Poor Puss, who shot her?—Baxter and Barnes | 139 |
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