other; he was a clever lad, and had made a sketch of the exterior,
and a view of the enclosure fronting the Palace. He had left his
service two days since, and witness was very much distressed, as were
his parents, to know what had become of him. Upon reading the
accounts in the newspapers, he immediately went to Tothill Fields,
and identified him, much to the gratification of his father, who
supposed that he had drowned himself, the latter having, on account
of his son's bad conduct, turned him out of doors.

The Magistrate, after telling the boy that he would, most likely, be
committed for trial, asked him what he could say in his defence.

Prisoner: I wished to see the Palace, and I went in with a man in a
fustian jacket. I had the whole range of the Palace for a day or
two, but the money found upon me I picked up in one of the rooms.

Mr. White: Tell me the truth, for I am about to send you for trial.

Prisoner: Oh, very well; with all my heart.

He was fully committed to the Westminster Sessions, and all parties
bound over to prosecute.

He was tried on 28 Dec., and was most ably defended by his Counsel, Mr.
Prendergast, who turned everything to ridicule, and the jury returned a
verdict of Not Guilty, regarding the escapade in the light of a youthful
folly, and being, also, mindful of the fact that the boy did not enter
the Palace for the purpose of theft.

But we shall hear of THE BOY JONES again.

CHAPTER VIII.

Death of Lord Norbury--Birth of photography--Experimental street
pavements--Forecast of the Queen's marriage--Sad story of Lady Flora
Hastings--Story of a climbing boy--Van Amburgh--Embanking the
Thames--Victoria Park--Robbery of gold dust.

In a book, professedly of Gossip, politics should be strictly kept in the
background--but at this time Ireland was seething with sedition. Still I
should hardly have adverted to it, had not the deliberate and brutal
murder of the Earl of Norbury, on 1 Jan., set all tongues wagging. His
Lordship was walking in the shrubbery, near his own house at Kilbeggan,
in the county of Meath, talking to his steward, and pointing out to him
some trees he wished to have cut down, when some miscreant, behind a
hedge, fired a blunder-buss loaded with swan shot at him, and he fell,
mortally wounded. He lived for 43 hours afterwards--but his assassin ran
away and escaped; nor, in spite of large