Having remarked the inefficiency manifested by the officer to whom the management of the murder case at the railway was assigned, I think it fair to state, that amongst some other members of our detective division, I have known instances in which great sagacity and promptitude were evinced. Shortly after my appointment to the magistracy, an old man died in a lodging-house in Bishop Street. The place in which he had lived for nine or ten years was a small room without the slightest indication of comfort or even of cleanliness. Nevertheless, he was reputed to have been possessed of a considerable sum of money, which was supposed to be hoarded in some part of his humble habitation. Two of his relatives made oath that they believed him to have accumulated some hundreds of pounds; that they suspected and believed that the cash had been purloined; and they demanded that the house should be strictly searched. I gave a search-warrant to a detective named James Brennan, who proceeded to the house, and stated his function to the landlady. She declared that the man had been miserably poor, that he died in complete destitution, and that they had to bury him in a parish coffin. Brennan searched the premises most rigidly, but the expected treasure was not forthcoming. Some of the landlady's female neighbours expressed great indignation at "any honest woman's place being ransacked after such a manner." One of the garrulous sympathizers declared that "so far was the landlady from having a lot of money, that she was hard set to live, and that the very night the old man died, the poor woman had to pledge her best feather bed, at Booth's the pawnbroker's, for a few shillings." Brennan took his leave, and immediately went to the pawn-office. He had the bed produced, and observed that the stitching on one seam was fresher in appearance than on the others. He ripped the seam, and in the middle of the feathers he found seven notes, each of a £100, and two of £20. The affair eventuated in the money being divided amongst the kindred of the deceased. The landlady denied all knowledge of the money, and insisted that the old man must have concealed it himself. She was not prosecuted, but Brennan's intelligence was rewarded with one of the £20 notes.