A gentleman, visiting at Canterbury, in 1834, was induced through the representations of the same notorious cheat to purchase a pair of spectacles, which were warranted to dissipate the cataract forming in his eye; the price paid was five pounds. As he was lamenting the terrible state in which he was informed his eyes certainly were (although, strange to say, he was quite unconscious of it) another pair was placed upon his nose, which, he was told he ought to wear as a change, in case the eyes were pained by the efforts of the first pair to dissipate the cataract. Another five pound note was handed over to the hawker, who began to grow quite pathetic; and artfully alluding to the services of the gentleman during the war, and expatiating upon a few circumstances with which he had made himself acquainted in a chat with one of the gossips at the public house where he lodged, he pretended to lament the necessity for the gentleman staying within doors. “What, may I not take a walk or ride as usual? I can’t endure being cooped up within doors.” “There’s danger in your going out,” said the pedlar, “except your eyes are guarded with green Refractive Preservers.” “Oh, bless me,” said the gentleman, “that’s very serious; then you really think I ought to have another pair for walking and riding, eh?” “Oh certainly, by all means; nothing else can save your eyes, unless you confine yourself within doors.” “What’s the price of such a pair of preservers?” “Six guineas, Sir; but as you have bought the others you shall have them for five pounds.” “Why, dear me, I shall be ruined in buying spectacles, and yet I never felt that I wanted them before.” “That’s just the vay, ven the eyes are a’going blind it comes on all at once, my tear Sir.” By this transaction the pedlar actually pocketed three five pound notes. In less than a week afterwards the first two pair were sent to me to have the yellow coloured glasses exchanged for white lenses of four degrees less magnifying power; the price at which the whole three pairs could have been purchased elsewhere would be forty-five shillings. It will scarcely be credited that the individuals who thus practise on the public are grossly ignorant; and were it not that the anxiety of the purchasers to possess something extraordinary renders them liable to imposition and allays suspicion, such shallow pretensions never would pass undetected.