The Tables Turned | Page 7

little; it is important that I should get an accurate note of
this (_writing_). Those who live in this metropolis must have their
bowels drawn out--is that right?
Pot. This capital, he said, my lord.
_J. N_. (_writing_). This capital. Well, well, well! I cannot guess why
the prisoner should be so infuriated against this metropolis. Go on, Mr.
Hungary.
_Mr. H_. (_to witness_). Can you remember any other words he said?
Pot. Yes; later on he said, "I hope to see the last Londoner hung in the
guts of the last member of Parliament."

_J. N_. Londoner, eh?
Pot. Yes, my lord; that is, he meant Londoner.
_J. N_. You mustn't say what he meant, you must say what you heard
him say.
Pot. Capital, my lord.
_J. N_. I see; (_writing_). The last dweller in the metropolis.
Pot. Capital, my lord.
_J. N_. Yes, exactly; that's just what I've written--this metropolis.
Pot. He said capital, my lord.
_Mr. H_. Capital, the witness says, my lord.
_J. N_. Well, doesn't that mean the same thing? I tell you I've got it
down accurately.
_J. F_. (who has been looking from one to the other with an amused
_smile, now says as if he were thinking aloud_:) Well, I am damned!
what a set of fools!
_J. N_. What is that you said, sir? Have you no sense of decency, sir?
Are you pleading, or are you not pleading? I have a great mind to have
you removed.
_J. F_. (_laughing_). Oh, by all means remove me! I didn't ask to be
here. Only look here, I could set you right in three minutes if you only
let me.
_J. N_. Do you want to ask the witness anything? If not, sir, hold your
tongue, sir. No, sir; don't speak, sir. I can see that you are meditating
bullying me; let me advise you, sir, not to try it.
_Mr. H_. (to POT.) Was that the only occasion on which you heard him

speaking?
Pot. No; I have heard him speaking in Hyde Park and saying much the
same thing, and calling Mr. Justice Nupkins a damned old fool!
_J. N_. (_writing_). "A damned old fool!" Anything else?
Pot. A blasted old cheat!
_J. N_. (_writing_). "A blasted old cheat!" (_Cheerfully_) Go on.
Pot. Another time he was talking in a public-house with two men
whom I understood to be members of the Fabian League. He was
having words with them, and one of them said, "Ah, but you forget the
rent of ability"; and he said, "Damn the rent of ability, I will smash
their rents of abilities."
_Mr. H_. Did you know what that meant?
Pot. No; not then.
_Mr. H_. But you do now?
Pot. Yes; for I got into conversation with one of them, who told me that
it meant the brain, the skull.
_J. N_. (_writing_). "The rent of ability is a cant phrase in use among
these people signifying the head."
_Mr. H_. Well?
Pot. Well, then they laughed and said, Well, as far as he is concerned,
smash it when you can catch it.
_Mr. H_. Did you gather whose head it was that they were speaking of?
Pot. Yes; his lordship's.
_Mr. H_. (_impressively and plaintively_). And _why_?

Pot. Because they said he had jugged their comrades like a damned old
smoutch!
_J. N_. _Jugged_?
Pot. Put them in prison, my lord.
_J. N_. (_Aside_: That Norwich affair.) Wait! I must write my self
down a smoutch--smoutch? no doubt a foreign word.
_Mr. H_. What else have you heard the prisoner say.
Pot. I have heard him threaten to make her Majesty the Queen take in
washing.
_J. N_. Plain washing?
Pot. Yes, my lord.
_J. N_. Not fancy work?
Pot. No, my lord.
A Juryman. Have you heard him suggest any means of doing all this?
Pot. Yes, sir; for I have attended meetings of his association in disguise,
when they were plotting means of exciting the populace.
_Mr. H_. In which he took part?
Pot. In which he took part.
_Mr. H_. You heard him arranging with others for a rising of the lower
orders?
Pot. Yes, sir; and on the occasion, when I met him in the public house,
I got into conversation with him, and he told me that his society
numbered upwards of two millions. (J. F. grins.)

The Juryman (_anxiously_). Armed?
Pot. He said there were arms in readiness for them.
_Mr. H_. Did you find out where?
Pot. Yes; at the premises of the Federationist League, 13 Farringdon
Road.
_Mr. H_. Did you search for them there?
Pot. Yes.
_Mr. H_. Did you find them?
Pot. No; we found nothing but printing-stock and some very shabby
furniture, and the office-boy, and three compositors.
_Mr. H_. Did you arrest them?