I remember such a case in the Thames Police Court. I pride myself that I have good eyes and ears, and a fair working knowledge of men and things; but I confess, as I stood in that court-room, that I was half bewildered by the amazing despatch4 with which drunks, disorderlies, vagrants6, brawlers, wife-beaters, thieves, fences, gamblers, and women of the street went through the machine of justice. The dock stood in the centre of the court (where the light is best), and into it and out again stepped men, women, and children, in a stream as steady as the stream of sentences which fell from the magistrate7’s lips.
I was still pondering over a consumptive “fence” who had pleaded inability to work and necessity for supporting wife and children, and who had received a year at hard labour, when a young boy of about twenty appeared in the dock. “Alfred Freeman,” I caught his name, but failed to catch the charge. A stout8 and motherly-looking woman bobbed up in the witness-box and began her testimony9. Wife of the Britannia lock-keeper, I learned she was. Time, night; a splash; she ran to the lock and found the prisoner in the water.
I flashed my gaze from her to him. So that was the charge, self-murder. He stood there dazed and unheeding, his bonny brown hair rumpled10 down his forehead, his face haggard and careworn11 and boyish still.
“Yes, sir,” the lock-keeper’s wife was saying. “As fast as I pulled to get ’im out, ’e crawled back. Then I called for ’elp, and some workmen ’appened along, and we got ’im out and turned ’im over to the constable12.”
The magistrate complimented the woman on her muscular powers, and the court-room laughed; but all I could see was a boy on the threshold of life, passionately13 crawling to muddy death, and there was no laughter in it.
A man was now in the witness-box, testifying to the boy’s good character and giving extenuating14 evidence. He was the boy’s foreman, or had been. Alfred was a good boy, but he had had lots of trouble at home, money matters. And then his mother was sick. He was given to worrying, and he worried over it till he laid himself out and wasn’t fit for work. He (the foreman), for the sake of his own reputation, the boy’s work being bad, had been forced to ask him to resign.
“Anything to say?” the magistrate demanded abruptly15.
The boy in the dock mumbled16 something indistinctly. He was still dazed.
“What does he say, constable?” the magistrate asked impatiently.
The stalwart man in blue bent17 his ear to the prisoner’s lips, and then replied loudly, “He says he’s very sorry, your Worship.”
“Remanded,” said his Worship; and the next case was under way, the first witness already engaged in taking the oath. The boy, dazed and unheeding, passed out with the jailer. That was all, five minutes from start to finish; and two hulking brutes19 in the dock were trying strenuously20 to shift the responsibility of the possession of a stolen fishing-pole, worth probably ten cents.
The chief trouble with these poor folk is that they do not know how to commit suicide, and usually have to make two or three attempts before they succeed. This, very naturally, is a horrid21 nuisance to the constables22 and magistrates23, and gives them no end of trouble. Sometimes, however, the magistrates are frankly24 outspoken25 about the matter, and censure27 the prisoners for the slackness of their attempts. For instance Mr. R. S— — chairman of the S—— B—— magistrates, in the case the other day of Ann Wood, who tried to make away with herself in the canal: “If you wanted to do it, why didn’t you do it and get it done with?” demanded the indignant Mr. R. S——. “Why did you not get under the water and make an end of it, instead of giving us all this trouble and bother?”
Poverty, misery28, and fear of the workhouse, are the principal causes of suicide among the working classes. “I’ll drown myself before I go into the workhouse,” said Ellen Hughes Hunt, aged18 fifty-two. Last Wednesday they held an inquest on her body at Shoreditch. Her husband came from the Islington Workhouse to testify. He had been a cheesemonger, but failure in business and poverty had driven him into the workhouse, whither his wife had refused to accompany him.
She was last seen at one in the morning. Three hours later her hat and jacket were found on the towing path by the Regent’s Canal, and later her body was fished from the water. Verdict: Suicide during temporary insanity29.
Such verdicts are crimes against truth. The Law is a lie, and through it men lie most shamelessly. For instance, a disgraced woman, forsaken30 and spat5 upon by kith and kin3, doses herself and her baby with laudanum. The baby dies; but she pulls through after a few weeks in hospital, is charged with murder, convicted, and sentenced to ten years’ penal31 servitude. Recovering, the Law holds her responsible for her actions; yet, had she died, the same Law would have rendered a verdict of temporary insanity.
Now, considering the case of Ellen Hughes Hunt, it is as fair and logical to say that her husband was suffering from temporary insanity when he went into the Islington Workhouse, as it is to say that she was suffering from temporary insanity when she went into the Regent’s Canal. As to which is the preferable sojourning place is a matter of opinion, of intellectual judgment32. I, for one, from what I know of canals and workhouses, should choose the canal, were I in a similar position. And I make bold to contend that I am no more insane than Ellen Hughes Hunt, her husband, and the rest of the human herd34.
Man no longer follows instinct with the old natural fidelity35. He has developed into a reasoning creature, and can intellectually cling to life or discard life just as life happens to promise great pleasure or pain. I dare to assert that Ellen Hughes Hunt, defrauded36 and bilked of all the joys of life which fifty-two years’ service in the world has earned, with nothing but the horrors of the workhouse before her, was very rational and level-headed when she elected to jump into the canal. And I dare to assert, further, that the jury had done a wiser thing to bring in a verdict charging society with temporary insanity for allowing Ellen Hughes Hunt to be defrauded and bilked of all the joys of life which fifty-two years’ service in the world had earned.
Temporary insanity! Oh, these cursed phrases, these lies of language, under which people with meat in their bellies37 and whole shirts on their backs shelter themselves, and evade38 the responsibility of their brothers and sisters, empty of belly39 and without whole shirts on their backs.
From one issue of the Observer, an East End paper, I quote the following commonplace events:—
A ship’s fireman, named Johnny King, was charged with attempting to commit suicide. On Wednesday defendant40 went to Bow Police Station and stated that he had swallowed a quantity of phosphor paste, as he was hard up and unable to obtain work. King was taken inside and an emetic41 administered, when he vomited42 up a quantity of the poison. Defendant now said he was very sorry. Although he had sixteen years’ good character, he was unable to obtain work of any kind. Mr. Dickinson had defendant put back for the court missionary43 to see him.
Timothy Warner, thirty-two, was remanded for a similar offence. He jumped off Limehouse Pier44, and when rescued, said, “I intended to do it.”
A decent-looking young woman, named Ellen Gray, was remanded on a charge of attempting to commit suicide. About half-past eight on Sunday morning Constable 834 K found defendant lying in a doorway45 in Benworth Street, and she was in a very drowsy46 condition. She was holding an empty bottle in one hand, and stated that some two or three hours previously47 she had swallowed a quantity of laudanum. As she was evidently very ill, the divisional surgeon was sent for, and having administered some coffee, ordered that she was to be kept awake. When defendant was charged, she stated that the reason why she attempted to take her life was she had neither home nor friends.
I do not say that all people who commit suicide are sane33, no more than I say that all people who do not commit suicide are sane. Insecurity of food and shelter, by the way, is a great cause of insanity among the living. Costermongers, hawkers, and pedlars, a class of workers who live from hand to mouth more than those of any other class, form the highest percentage of those in the lunatic asylums48. Among the males each year, 26.9 per 10,000 go insane, and among the women, 36.9. On the other hand, of soldiers, who are at least sure of food and shelter, 13 per 10,000 go insane; and of farmers and graziers, only 5.1. So a coster is twice as likely to lose his reason as a soldier, and five times as likely as a farmer.
Misfortune and misery are very potent50 in turning people’s heads, and drive one person to the lunatic asylum49, and another to the morgue or the gallows51. When the thing happens, and the father and husband, for all of his love for wife and children and his willingness to work, can get no work to do, it is a simple matter for his reason to totter52 and the light within his brain go out. And it is especially simple when it is taken into consideration that his body is ravaged53 by innutrition and disease, in addition to his soul being torn by the sight of his suffering wife and little ones.
“He is a good-looking man, with a mass of black hair, dark, expressive54 eyes, delicately chiselled55 nose and chin, and wavy56, fair moustache.” This is the reporter’s description of Frank Cavilla as he stood in court, this dreary57 month of September, “dressed in a much worn grey suit, and wearing no collar.”
Frank Cavilla lived and worked as a house decorator in London. He is described as a good workman, a steady fellow, and not given to drink, while all his neighbours unite in testifying that he was a gentle and affectionate husband and father.
His wife, Hannah Cavilla, was a big, handsome, light-hearted woman. She saw to it that his children were sent neat and clean (the neighbours all remarked the fact) to the Childeric Road Board School. And so, with such a man, so blessed, working steadily58 and living temperately59, all went well, and the goose hung high.
Then the thing happened. He worked for a Mr. Beck, builder, and lived in one of his master’s houses in Trundley Road. Mr. Beck was thrown from his trap and killed. The thing was an unruly horse, and, as I say, it happened. Cavilla had to seek fresh employment and find another house.
This occurred eighteen months ago. For eighteen months he fought the big fight. He got rooms in a little house in Batavia Road, but could not make both ends meet. Steady work could not be obtained. He struggled manfully at casual employment of all sorts, his wife and four children starving before his eyes. He starved himself, and grew weak, and fell ill. This was three months ago, and then there was absolutely no food at all. They made no complaint, spoke26 no word; but poor folk know. The housewives of Batavia Road sent them food, but so respectable were the Cavillas that the food was sent anonymously60, mysteriously, so as not to hurt their pride.
The thing had happened. He had fought, and starved, and suffered for eighteen months. He got up one September morning, early. He opened his pocket-knife. He cut the throat of his wife, Hannah Cavilla, aged thirty-three. He cut the throat of his first-born, Frank, aged twelve. He cut the throat of his son, Walter, aged eight. He cut the throat of his daughter, Nellie, aged four. He cut the throat of his youngest-born, Ernest, aged sixteen months. Then he watched beside the dead all day until the evening, when the police came, and he told them to put a penny in the slot of the gas-meter in order that they might have light to see.
Frank Cavilla stood in court, dressed in a much worn grey suit, and wearing no collar. He was a good-looking man, with a mass of black hair, dark, expressive eyes, delicately chiselled nose and chin, and wavy, fair moustache.
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1
precarious
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| adj.不安定的，靠不住的；根据不足的 | |
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inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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kin
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| n.家族，亲属，血缘关系；adj.亲属关系的，同类的 | |
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despatch
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| n./v.(dispatch)派遣；发送；n.急件；新闻报道 | |
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spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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vagrants
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| 流浪者( vagrant的名词复数 )； 无业游民； 乞丐； 无赖 | |
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magistrate
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| n.地方行政官，地方法官，治安官 | |
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testimony
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| n.证词；见证，证明 | |
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rumpled
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| v.弄皱，使凌乱( rumple的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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careworn
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| adj.疲倦的，饱经忧患的 | |
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constable
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| n.(英国)警察，警官 | |
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passionately
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| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
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extenuating
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| adj.使减轻的，情有可原的v.（用偏袒的辩解或借口）减轻( extenuate的现在分词 )；低估，藐视 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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mumbled
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| 含糊地说某事，叽咕，咕哝( mumble的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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brutes
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| 兽( brute的名词复数 )； 畜生； 残酷无情的人； 兽性 | |
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strenuously
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| adv.奋发地，费力地 | |
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horrid
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| adj.可怕的；令人惊恐的；恐怖的；极讨厌的 | |
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constables
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| n.警察( constable的名词复数 ) | |
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magistrates
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| 地方法官，治安官( magistrate的名词复数 ) | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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outspoken
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| adj.直言无讳的，坦率的，坦白无隐的 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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censure
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| v./n.责备；非难；责难 | |
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misery
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| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
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insanity
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| n.疯狂，精神错乱；极端的愚蠢，荒唐 | |
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Forsaken
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| adj. 被遗忘的, 被抛弃的 动词forsake的过去分词 | |
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penal
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| adj.刑罚的；刑法上的 | |
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judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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sane
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| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
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herd
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| n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起 | |
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fidelity
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| n.忠诚，忠实；精确 | |
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defrauded
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| v.诈取，骗取( defraud的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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bellies
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| n.肚子( belly的名词复数 )；腹部；（物体的）圆形或凸起部份；腹部…形的 | |
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evade
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| vt.逃避，回避；避开，躲避 | |
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belly
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| n.肚子，腹部；(像肚子一样)鼓起的部分，膛 | |
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defendant
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| n.被告；adj.处于被告地位的 | |
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emetic
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| n.催吐剂；adj.催吐的 | |
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vomited
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missionary
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| adj.教会的，传教(士)的；n.传教士 | |
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pier
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| n.码头；桥墩，桥柱；[建]窗间壁，支柱 | |
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45
doorway
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| n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径 | |
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drowsy
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| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
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previously
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| adv.以前，先前（地） | |
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asylums
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| n.避难所( asylum的名词复数 )；庇护；政治避难；精神病院 | |
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asylum
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| n.避难所，庇护所，避难 | |
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50
potent
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| adj.强有力的，有权势的；有效力的 | |
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gallows
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| n.绞刑架，绞台 | |
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52
totter
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| v.蹒跚， 摇摇欲坠；n.蹒跚的步子 | |
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53
ravaged
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| 毁坏( ravage的过去式和过去分词 )； 蹂躏； 劫掠； 抢劫 | |
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54
expressive
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| adj.表现的，表达…的，富于表情的 | |
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55
chiselled
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| adj.凿过的，凿光的； （文章等）精心雕琢的v.凿，雕，镌( chisel的过去式 ) | |
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56
wavy
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| adj.有波浪的，多浪的，波浪状的，波动的，不稳定的 | |
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57
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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temperately
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| adv.节制地，适度地 | |
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anonymously
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| ad.用匿名的方式 | |
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