The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 339: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

CHAPTER XXIV THE CRIME Ir was between nine and ten o’clock in the evening of that day of which we have been writing in the preceding chapter, that three persons were advancing in three different directions toward the gold-beater’s house in the midst of that maze of buildings lying between the lower parts of the Waterloo and Westminster Roads. One of those individuals was Barney the Burker, the second was Bill Scott, the third was his brother Tim. The two lads had been informed by Barnes that if they joined him at the Smedleys’, they would probably be able to render some little assistance in a particular business which was then in hand, but beyond these few words the Burker gave no special explanations. The night was dark and cold, not with the fine frosty weather which properly belonged to that December season of the year, but with a raw mistiness that damped the garments and collected on the hair and whiskers. It was an evening when those who were well clad would wrap their upper coats or their shawls, as the case might be, more closely around them, and when the scantily apparelled and the ragged children of poverty would hurry on with a con- tinuous shivering of the frame which no acceleration of speed could however mitigate. Even the very baked-potato man would shudder visibly as he bawled out “ All hot!” in a lustier voice than usual, and there was no need for naked-footed mendicants to affect a quivering misery of the form as they huddled up in doorways or hung upon the track of passers-by, imploring alms, for the reality of their half- perished state was keen enough. The street-lamps appeared to burn mistily, and the jets of gas at the butcher’s shops 308 CORNICLIOOKS (EO)