1829.] Affairs in General. 291 
We remember to have seen, inthe letters of a tourist some years since, 
a proud boast of the pre-eminence of London thievery. “I wandered,’’ 
said the patriotic tourist, “« from end to end of Paris, and I protest in the 
most solemn manner that I did not see above a dozen reputed thieves, 
and those of the most contemptible appearance. They wanted the force, 
the fearless gait, the determined, business-look of the London thief. I 
do not think that there was a man among them capable of any thing 
above a petty larceny.” 
The tourist was a good observer, for such is the fact ; but he was no 
philosopher, or he would have discovered that the true cause of this 
national inferiority is not in the want of a turn for the trade of transfer, 
but in the want of opportunity, the public profession being actually 
starved by the quantity of private practice—a matter which occurs in 
more professions than one in the capital of all the Graces. But the 
following paragraph in the papers makes us dread the loss of our 
acknowledged superiority in the science :— ’ 
“ A daring burglary was committed, on Tuesday night, at Covent 
Garden Theatre, when nearly the whole of the musical instruments were 
taken from a lumber-room under the stage, the place where they are 
usually deposited. The robbery was discovered early the next morning, 
when it appeared that the thieves had effected an entrance into the 
interior of the theatre, by cutting away one of the panes of glass. A 
cremona, one of the instruments stolen, belonging to Mr. Bowden, one 
of the band, worth forty guineas, was only recovered from a pawn- 
broker’s shop about six weeks ago, which had previously been stolen 
from the theatre.” 
This paragraph is altogether unworthy of the London papers, the 
theatre, and the thieves. When gallant men are reduced so low as to 
steal any fiddle that has been heard in the orchestra of either of the 
theatres for the last ten years, we can only weep over the degradation of 
burglary. The next fall will be to sweep off the trumpets and jew’s-harps 
of Bartholomew Fair, and make catcalls scarce in the market. It is true 
that there may have been some legal dexterity in the choice ; for as no 
jury will hang a man for less than from three to four shillings, there 
was comparative safety in carrying off goods, the best of which could 
not be valued at half-a-crown, ‘As for the cremona, which had so lately 
returned from the pawnbroker’s, we entirely disbelieve the story that 
there was any compulsion in the matter. The cremona, of course, being 
the only one of the kind in the orchestra, and not liking the rascal society 
of the machines of English handy-work and Norway deal round him, 
disdained to remain solo, and went to look for a due accompaniment 
the pawnbroker’s, to which it had so often gone before that it could now 
make its way blindfold. 
_ His Royal Highness the Duke of Cumberland’s arrival was eagerly 
looked for, and the libellers of the Royal Family declared at once that he 
was coming over to vote against the principles that actually seated his 
family on the throne. He soon gave them their answer ; and, we have 
reason to think, that he has given more powerful personages their answer | 
too, by this time. His speech in the Lords is prompt, powerful, and 
decisive :— 
iy The Duke of Cumberland said he never rose to address their lordships 
with more painful feelings than he felt at that moment. Indeed, he begged 
assure their lordships that nothing but the duty which he felt he owed to 
