2" d S. IX. Jan. 14. '60.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



21 



seem, Sir," said he, " to look at me as though you had 

 seen me before." Mr. v Simcox acknowledged that 

 his host was right in his conjectures, but con- 

 fessed his entire inability to recal the occasion. 

 " You are right, Sir," replied the old gentleman ; 

 " and if you will pledge your word as a man of 

 honour to keep my secret, and not to disclose to any 

 one what I am now going to tell you until you have 

 seen the notice of my death in the London papers, 

 I have no objection to remind you where and how 

 you have known me. 



"In St. James's Park, near Spring Gardens, you 

 may pass every day an old man who sweeps a cross- 

 ing there, and whose begging is attended by this 

 strange peculiarity ; that whatever be the amount 

 of the alms bestowed on him he will retain only a 

 halfpenny, and will scrupulously return to the 

 donor all the rest. Such an unusual proceeding 

 naturally excites the curiosity of those who hear 

 of it; and any one who has himself made the ex- 

 periment, when he happens to be walking by with 

 a friend, is almost sure to say to him, ' Do you see 

 that old fellow there ? He is the strangest beg- 

 gar you ever saw in your life. If you give him 

 sixpence he will be sure to give you five pence half- 

 penny back again.' Of course his friend makes 

 the experiment, which turns out as predicted; and, 

 as crowds of people are continually passing, there 

 are numbers of persons every day who make the 

 same trial; and thus the old man gets many a half- 

 penny from the curiosity of the passers-by, in ad- 

 dition to what he obtains from their compassion. 



"I, Sir," continued the old gentleman, "am that 

 beggar. Many years ago I first hit upon this ex- 

 pedient for the relief of my then pressing necessi- 

 ties ; for I was at that time utterly destitute ; but 

 finding the scheme answer beyond my expecta- 

 tions, I was induced to carry it on until I had at 

 last, with the aid of profitable investments, realised 

 a handsome fortune, enabling me to live in the 

 comfort in which you find me this day. And 

 now, Sir, such is the force of habit, that though I 

 am no longer under any necessity for continuing 

 this plan, I find myself quite unable to give it up ; 

 and accordingly every morning I leave home, ap- 

 parently for business purposes, and go to a room 

 where I put on my old beggar's clothes, and con- 

 tinue sweeping my crossing in the park till a 

 certain hour in the afternoon, when I go back to 

 my room, resume my usual dress, and return 

 home in time for dinner as you see me this day." 



Mr. Simcox, as a gentleman and a man of 

 honour, scrupulously fulfilled his pledge; but hav- 

 ing seen in the London papers the announcement 

 of the beggar's death, lie then communicated this 

 strange story to my friend. Whether he men- 

 tioned his name or not, I cannot tell ; but I do not 

 remember ever to have heard it, nor did I feel 

 at liberty to ask for it. The friend from whom I 

 heard this narrative died in 1838, and from his 



manner of relating the incident I should infer that 

 it had probably taken place some twenty or thirty 

 years before. 



As the interest of this narrative altogether con - 

 sists in its being a statement of fact, though 

 strange as any fiction, I think it my duty to au- 

 thenticate it with my name and address. 



Samuel Bache, 

 Minister of the New Meeting-House, 

 Birmingham. 

 December 21, 1859. 



P.S. I have to-day read the foregoing narrative 

 to Robert Martineau, Esq., a magistrate of this 

 borough, who authorises me to say that he has a 

 distinct recollection of it, having himself heard it 

 from the same friend, and is also able, therefore, 

 to authenticate this statement. S. B. 



THE GRAFFITI OF POMPEII. 

 As many of your. readers will be doubtless in- 

 terested in all that relates to the city of Pompeii, 

 I venture to send you a few notes descriptive of 

 the following work : — 



" Graffiti de Pompe'i. Inscriptions et Gravures tracers au 

 stylet recueillies et interprelees par Raphael Garrucci. 

 Seconde edition, 4to. Paris, 1856. Text, 4to. and Atlas 

 of Plates." 



These notes are founded upon the text of this 

 work, or are extracts from an article in the Edin- 

 burgh Review, No. 224., October, 1859 ; but more 

 especially from a most interesting tract, 



" Inscriptiones Pompeianje, or Specimens and Fac- 

 similes of Ancient Inscriptions discovered on the Walls 

 of Buildings at Pompeii, bvDr. Christopher Wordsworth. 

 8vo. London. J. Murray,* 1837." 



Now what are these Graffiti? Street scrib- 

 blings found rudely traced in charcoal or red 

 chalk, or scratched with a stylus in the plaster of 

 the walls or pillars in the public places of the city. 

 A Londoner whose memory is well stored with 

 whitewash of this kind, who can recall the gallant 

 fleet which sailed down of aforetime the long brick 

 wall of Kew Gardens, who remembers the pressing 

 appeals made to him to secure his fortune by 

 "Go to Bysh's Lucky Corner," who can revive the 

 moral injunctions which met him on all sides of 

 "Try Warren's" or "Buy Day and M-irtin's 

 Blacking," whose patriotism was stirred by " Vote 

 for Liberty and Sir Francis Burdett," or whose 

 humanity was awakened by " an appeal on behalf 

 of Buggins and his six small children," may per- 

 haps smile at a work which has exhumed in some 

 respects not very dissimilar whitewash, although 

 generally of a higher character, and of which the 

 " scribble " is accompanied by a learned disserta- 

 tion. But constituted as man is, he has ever an 

 interest in all that illustrates the social history of 

 man. We live through associations — with the past 



