There are innumerable miscreants who thrive upon the possession of some discreditable secret or family skeleton, which throws a desolating blight over many a life, to all appearance surrounded by every comfort and luxury wealth can command. Scoundrels of this description, secure in the helplessness of their victims, pursue with impunity their merciless system of extortion, being well aware that the terror of exposure is so great, that silence will be purchased at any price. If persons who are threatened by ruffians of this kind with exposure of some private matter, were once and for all to refuse to pay one penny for the silence of these extortioners, how much misery would be avoided! Each instalment of hush-money only serves to whet the appetites of these social harpies. It is infinitely preferable to face boldly at first the worst, no matter of how serious a nature, than to supply blackmail for the purchase of what can never be security. The majority of malefactors are cowards at heart, although a craven nature is in such cases concealed often by bluster and braggadocio. It therefore becomes all the more important at once to withstand their infamous importunities. The ordinary observer, while reading in some sensational novel the evil deeds and extortion perpetrated by the class of knaves who subsist on hush-money, would be inclined to attribute them to romance. It is, however, well known to those who have had experience in criminal matters, that the novelist’s fertile imagination pales before stern reality. Innocent persons have been threatened with an accusation of some infamous crime, and at the same time money has been demanded as the price of silence. The dread caused by even an accusation of such a nature has often, unfortunately, induced persons so situated to accede to extortionate demands. There are plenty of _mauvais sujets_ hovering about society who make it their business to become intimate with the private history of those upon whose infirmities they intend to trade. Not many years since, a notable instance of this occurred. A gentleman in a high social position was ruthlessly assailed and socially ruined by a miscreant, who traded upon the possession of some information of a dubious nature reflecting discredit upon his wife. For a lengthened period this gentleman had paid considerable sums of money for the silence of his persecutor; at last, however, driven to desperation by continual and increased demands for hush-money, he preferred rather to face a public trial than continue longer subject to such tyranny and extortion.