Puck — June 11, 1879 — page 3: what you’re looking at

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

PUCK. 211 HOW OUR CRIMINALS ARE NOT KEPT. HERE is a sort of juggling with our criminal classes, which the police and the jail-keepers indulge in, which is very interesting news to read over our breakfast- tables when nicely served up to us by the reporter, but which does not tend to make the non-criminal classes feel more secure in-their property or their lives. This catching of a set of burglars with one hand and tossing up another set into the open air, is very fine as an act of prestidigitation; but meanwhile more banks are burst, more highway robberies are committed, and more pockets are feloniously investigated by the fingers of the peculator. But the worst of the matter is that it is all a business affair; that the big operator in thiev- ing feels a sort of security in the power his, money has over wardens and keepers to secure his liberty, when the verdict of juries and the sentence of judges hedge him in too closely. The unfortunate Lazarus who filches a stale loaf from the daker’s counter never escapes from his prison walls, but the daring operator who robs a bank of millions breaks down the stones which environ him, with a golden ham- mer, and walks forth into freedom—and more burglaries, ‘The stupidity of the police is proverbial; but why should they not be stupid? Why should they be ferrets to discover criminals and tigers to clutch them, if the criminals are to be merely put into jails from which they can escape when- ever they wish. How can we rejoice over Captain Byrne’s very clever arrest of the Man- hattan Bank burglars, if these latter gentry are to walk out of the Tombs some fine morning. It has come to that pass where, if we are to feel secure, the honest public must put up its money and outbid the burglarious fraternity. ‘There should be a tariff of prices for escapes, graduated according to the importance of the criminal and the value of his swag. As for instance: For a “Prince of Burglars”. .. For a “King of Bank Bursters For a ‘‘celebrated" pickpocket For a well known sneakthief. 2.980.00 For a daring shop-liftress. weve 1,025.00 For a “young kid”? of promise I" 250 The odd dollars in the above tariff are to be paid to flunkies and underlings who can be kept quiet if they get their beer; the bigger sums to go to wardens who wear diamonds and live in brown-stone houses, on salaries which the ordinary citizen would find all too insuf- ficient to pay his expenses in a tenement house, The well-understood practice of detectives in negotiating with great burglars and dividing with them is far less noxious to the well-being of society than this opening of doors to crimi- nals arrested and sentenced. The picture of a lot of his confederates bursting into Mr. “Red” Leary's cell through the walls of two buildings, and no keeper to hear, has its tragic as well as its comic side; the tragedy view rather more appreciable by the next cashier who is choked into suffocation while Mr. “Red” Leary and his gang get away with the dollars, And the kindness with which doors are opened in this hot weather; and great crimi- nals are allowed to roam into insecure kitchens to make coffee and prepare other delicacies of the table; are even allowed to meander— (how's meander? isn’t it good?)—about the jail yard to do landscape gardening—all these evidences of the sympathy—the fellow feeling, for a distinguished criminal which are shown by the average warden and keeper, denote either a high degree of Christian charity in the jailor's hearts or an appreciation of and a greed for spondoolixs in the jailor’s fists, We incline to believe it is the spondoolixs. Sharkey, Tweed, Porter, Irving, Red Leary $8,150.00 71375.00 34223.00 and others have all, in their day, escaped. McMaulligan, Hoffnagel and Peleg Dusenberry, who have filched a coat or been found dis- orderly, never did and never will escape. Is it not almost time for us either to make our jails secure against the greed of turnkey; or shall we do away with the force of employ- ing, at great expense, judges, juries and all the paraphernalia of courts of law, merely that the turnkeys may be bribed? ‘The good cook said, in reference to the culi- nary operations ona hare: “first catch your hare.” If she had known how things slip from the grasp after being caught, she might have added “and keep it.” So what is the use of catching criminals if we can’t keep them when caught ? THE DEMOCRATIC ASS. IN the train which carries this number of Puck to the anxious legislators in Washing- => ton, are also our heart-felt sympathies to the defunct Democracy. When it started into its extra-session as a sort of General Boum, with great bluster and braggadocia, we dis- covered the hoofs and the ears of the animal beneath the gorgeous trappings of the General. ‘The flourish of trumpets and the rolling of drums with which the Democratic majority went into its extra-session, determined to pound all the life out of the Republican party, made the injudicious grieve; but it made Puck howl with laughter. And the record of the past few months shows that we had reason for our mirth. There is no enemy to future success like present failure; and the young voter, just stepping into the arena of politics, will hardly array himself on the side of the defeated—the defeated through their own stupidity. ‘The Democratic Ass has brayed loudly, but it is not as the vic- torious roar of the king of beasts; and the bray elicits rather our chuckles than our admiration. Were the Democrats to set up as surgeons, we might admire their skill, for they have achieved, to their own discomfiture, however, a hitherto unheard of feat of surgical skill, and have put a back-bone in the President; which kindness he has had the unkindness to reward them for, by breaking the Democratic back- bone with three several and very ponderous vetoes. Whereat the Southern Democratic 1nule lifts his rear-ward heels at the Northern Democratic Ass, who brays defiance, yet is indefinite in his threats; while the hard and soft money donkey would. repudiate their Democratic origin en- tirely, if they only knew whither to go. We have seen a small boy steal a ride on a bob-tailed car unawed by the terrible language of the driver in his iron cage in front; and only induced to leave his perch on the step when the driver stopped his car and went for the infant with a whip, ‘Then the kid skipped into a door-way out of harm's way, only until the driver resumed his duties, when the child also resumed his perch, and with more or less of this by-play the amoosing little cuss secured his ride without the payment of the usual nickel, Here the driver was the majority and the small kid was the minority. It is the story of the triumph of smartness, As a fond parent feels it his duty to punish the child he loves, so we feel called upon to tell our dear Democratic brethren not to make an Ass of themselves; that is, not to send them- selves to Congress in the outward semblance of an Ass, Surely, there are statesmen among the Demo- crats, Where are they? ‘rot ’em out. This is the season of circuses; what a circus it would be to see a grand entrée of real Democrats who were not politicians, but statesmen. THE DOOK OF ARGYLE. HE arrival of Mr. Mac Callum More, a prominent member of the ducal trade with some interesting specimens of his family, has had the effect of creating a lively interest in the essentially British ornamentation known asdooks, in general, and this dook in particular. Mr. More is entitled to a fair amount of respect, certainly not because he is called or chooses to call himself a dook, but on account of his very respectable literary attainments, and from the fact of his having made a very decent member of a liberal English, Cabinet. The strongest point against Mr. More is that he, and his sons and daughters rather pride them- selves on his silly, demoralizing, menacing, hereditary titles, so offensive ‘to all thinking people in a free Republic. ‘The Campbells have always been a shrewd, canny race, and have invariably managed to stick to the victorious party. The family in common with a large number of other so-called royal and noble houses can boast of having had its fair share of choice blackguards and trait- ors, if that be anything to be proud of. We do not know the precise object of the visit of Mr. Mac Callum More, this gentleman being exceedingly reticent on the subject; but we have little doubt it is for the purpose of administering a good paternal spanking to his eldest son, the young gentleman known as Dr, Lorne, who is doing his level best— which doesn’t say much—to govern Canada. We hope that the rod will be judiciously ap- plied, and it may have the effect of preventing the youthful Dr. Lorne from flying in the face of his responsible advisers, and deter his wife, Mrs. Lorne, and Mr. Colonel Littleton from issuing any more low-necked ukases. A large number of correspondents are exces- sively anxious to know some particulars of the rank and career of his present dookship, Mr. Mac Cullum More. We have, therefore, much pleasure in placing the following facts, gathered at a very considerable outlay, at their disposal. Mr. Mac Cullum-More is a dook and is eighteen feet high. He is a lineal descendent of Commodore Noah of Ark fame, the “‘N” in the course of ages having become corrupted into an “M”, and the spelling also altered. He is sometimes called the dook of Argyle, on account, it is said, with what truth we know not, of his. penchant, as a youth, for dancing at the Argyle rooms, a well known London in- stitution which last year passed out of exist- ence, Mr. More has two canary-colored eyes, and an extra ducal Magenta one, which he only trots out on state occasions. His wink is re- ported to be very terrible. He is passionately devoted to Haggis, and always eats it with a fork and crowbar. He breakfasts on ice-bergs and bar-iron; the iron being cut into thin slices and fried, a la Marengo, in croton oil. This wholesome but rather rough diet accounts for the dook’s strong liberalism. From time immemorial Mr. More has been hereditary grand toothpick-holder to the monarchs of England. He is much attached to the Tower of London, the ‘Queen's summer residence, and has a perfect bijou of a bed- room 1,400 feet below the lowest dungeon of that remarkable fortress. The dook always carries the crown of Eng- land in his waistcoat pocket, in order to have it handy for the Queen to pat on when she wishes to scare any Radical who may be hang- ing around. His country seat is called Balmo- ral—named after Mrs. More's petticoats and once fashionable boots. Take him for all in all, Mr. MacCullum More is the sort of a man that Great Britain couldn’t very well get-along without. comicbooks.com