docks was shrill in the wind, and every little steamer coming and going across the Mersey
was sharp in its blowing off, and every buoy in the river bobbed spitefully up and down,
as if there were a general taunting chorus of 'Come along, Mercantile Jack! Ill-lodged, ill-
fed, ill-used, hocussed, entrapped, anticipated, cleaned out. Come along, Poor Mercantile
Jack, and be tempest-tossed till you are drowned!'
The uncommercial transaction which had brought me and Jack together, was this:- I had
entered the Liverpool police force, that I might have a look at the various unlawful traps
which are every night set for Jack. As my term of service in that distinguished corps was
short, and as my personal bias in the capacity of one of its members has ceased, no
suspicion will attach to my evidence that it is an admirable force. Besides that it is
composed, without favour, of the best men that can be picked, it is directed by an unusual
intelligence. Its organisation against Fires, I take to be much better than the metropolitan
system, and in all respects it tempers its remarkable vigilance with a still more
remarkable discretion.
Jack had knocked off work in the docks some hours, and I had taken, for purposes of
identification, a photograph-likeness of a thief, in the portrait-room at our head police
office (on the whole, he seemed rather complimented by the proceeding), and I had been
on police parade, and the small hand of the clock was moving on to ten, when I took up
my lantern to follow Mr. Superintendent to the traps that were set for Jack. In Mr.
Superintendent I saw, as anybody might, a tall, well-looking, well-set-up man of a
soldierly bearing, with a cavalry air, a good chest, and a resolute but not by any means
ungentle face. He carried in his hand a plain black walking-stick of hard wood; and
whenever and wherever, at any after-time of the night, he struck it on the pavement with
a ringing sound, it instantly produced a whistle out of the darkness, and a policeman. To
this remarkable stick, I refer an air of mystery and magic which pervaded the whole of
my perquisition among the traps that were set for Jack.
We began by diving into the obscurest streets and lanes of the port. Suddenly pausing in a
flow of cheerful discourse, before a dead wall, apparently some ten miles long, Mr.
Superintendent struck upon the ground, and the wall opened and shot out, with military
salute of hand to temple, two policemen - not in the least surprised themselves, not in the
least surprising Mr. Superintendent.
