Secret Service; or, Recollections of a City DetectiveForrester, Andrew
General
Secret Service; or, Recollections of a City Detective
Forrester, Andrew
Detective and mystery stories, English; Fiction; Short stories
There is another list or classification of men who are inclined towards
Conservatism (as, perhaps, some sardonic reader will suggest, every body
in an old place like N---- ought to be); and these men will take half as
much from the real supporter of our venerable institutions as they can
get from some mushroom pursy adventurer professing ultra-Radical
principles, who desires to make a market of his political influence, or
is perhaps anxious to satisfy the cravings for distinction of his wife
by getting himself as her marital adjunct returned to Parliament, and
privileged to wear M.P. after his name.
The third list or classification embraces those electors who have no
political principles, or character, or conscience whatever. These are
fellows who want as much from Conservative as from Radical or from Whig.
They are the scum and refuse, or dregs, of political life; and this foul
element of the political existence at N---- is by no means the smaller
portion of the three classifications.
The operator, or agent, as he likes to be called,--although, as
police-magistrates and all other people dealing with crime are aware,
the title "agent" is complimentary,--knows precisely with what material
he has to deal. He "plays his cards," as he sometimes describes his
anxious labours, accordingly; and is only liable to one derangement. It
is said that honesty and good faith towards one another is
characteristic of thief-life. I have, in a former volume, shown that
notion to be a fallacy. Politicians supply an additional proof of the
accuracy of my statement.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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