[Illustration: P] Poor Mr. Dyer! And so this gentleman has been dismissed
from the commission of the peace for humanely endeavouring to obtain the
release of Medhurst from confinement. Two or three thousand pounds, he
thought, given to some public charity, might persuade the Home Secretary to
remit the remainder of his sentence, and dispose the public to look upon
the prisoner with an indulgent eye.
Now, Mr. Punch, incline thy head, and let me whisper a secret into thine
ear. If the Whig ministry had not gone downright mad with the result of the
elections, instead of dismissing delectable Dyer, they would have had him
down upon the Pension List to such a tune as you wot not of, although of
tunes you are most curiously excellent. For, oh! what a project did he
unwittingly shadow forth of recruiting the exhausted budget! Such a one as
a sane Chancellor of the Exchequer would have seized upon, and shaken in
the face of "Robert the Devil," and his crew of "odious monopolists." Peel
must still have pined in hopeless opposition, when Baring opened his plan.
Listen! Mandeville wrote a book, entitled "Private Vices Public Benefits."
Why cannot public crimes, let me ask, be made so? you, perhaps, are not on
the instant prepared with an answer--but I am.
Let the Chancellor of the Exchequer forthwith prepare to discharge all the
criminals in Great Britain, of whatever description, from her respective
prisons, on the payment of a certain sum, to be regulated on the principle
of a graduated or "sliding scale."
A vast sum will be thus instantaneously raised,--not enough, however, you
will say, to supply the deficiency. I know it. But a moment's further
attention. Mr. Goulburn, many years since, being then Chancellor of the
Exchequer, and, like brother Baring, in a financial hobble, proposed that
on the payment, three years in advance, of the dog and hair-powder tax, all
parties so handsomely coming down with the "tin," should henceforth and for
ever rejoice in duty-free dog, and enjoy untaxed cranium. Now, why not a
proposition to this effect--that on the payment of a good round sum (let it
be pretty large, for the ready is required), a man shall be exempt from the
present legal consequences of any crime or crimes he may hereafter commit;
or, if this be thought an extravagant scheme, and not likely to take with
the public, at least let a list of prices be drawn up, that a man may know,
at a glance, at what cost he may gratify a pet crime or favourite little
foible. Thus:--
For cutting one's own child's head off--so much. (I really think I would
fix this at a high price, although I am well aware it has been done for
nothing.)
For murdering a father or a mother--a good sum.
For ditto, a grand ditto, or a great-grand ditto--not so much: their
leases, it is presumed, being about to fall in.
Uncles, aunts, cousins, friends, companions, and the community in
general--in proportion.
The cost of assaults and batteries, and other diversions, might be easily
arranged; only I must remark, that for assaulting policemen I would charge
high; that being, like the Italian Opera, for the most part, the
entertainment of the nobility.
You may object that the propounding such a scheme would be discreditable,
and that the thing is unprecedented. Reflect, my dear PUNCH, for an
instant. Surely, nothing can be deemed to be discreditable by a Whig
government, after the cheap sugar, cheap timber, cheap bread rigs. Why,
this is just what might have been expected from them. I wonder they had not
hit upon it. How it would have "agitated the masses!"
As to the want of a precedent, that is easily supplied. Pardons for all
sorts and sizes of crimes were commonly bought and sold in the reign of
James I.; nay, pardon granted in anticipation of crimes to be at a future
time committed.
After all, you see, Mr. Dyer's idea was not altogether original.
Your affectionate friend,