recovered their effects, but not before they disbursed to the jovial host, who 'loved every sod of the ould counthry, God bless it!' more than would have enabled them to fare sumptuously at the Astor. And as the great strapping fellow—who had since seen many a brave man die with his face to the foe—told the tale of his first introduction to the Empire City, he actually looked sheepish at its recollection, and then laughed heartily at a simplicity which had long since become, with him, a weakness of the past.
As a companion picture to the foregoing, the story of a Scotch victim, who was driven crazy by the vigorous application of the fleecing process, will exhibit the manner in which things were done before the Castle Garden era. This was part of the evidence taken in 1847:—
Testimony of the St. Andrew's Society. We, the undersigned, officers of St. Andrew's Society, in the city of Albany, do hereby certify that on or about the 2nd day of August last it was represented to us by a manager of our society that a Scotch emigrant, by the name of James Heeslop, had been grossly defrauded and swindled out of his money by the runners, or the robbing concerns for whom these runners do business. We immediately went on the dock, and made inquiries after Heeslop, when we were informed that he had been despatched on a boat to his destination; we had him followed to Troy, and brought back. The story he told the police justice, Cole, in our presence, in asking for a warrant against the notorious Smethurst, was in substance as follows:— That he arrived in New York from Scotland a few days previous; that his destination was Port Washington, in the State of Ohio: that he was accosted by a person in New York near the Albany steamboat, who represented himself as a forwarding agent, and with whom he (Heeslop) agreed for the passage of himself and family (three persons), from there to his destination, and paid the said agent, therefore, four British sovereigns, the agent consigning Heeslop to the care of Smethurst and Co. He gave Heeslop tickets which the agent told him would carry him through. That a short time after the boat started, Heeslop was accosted by a second person, who likewise represented himself as forwarding agent, and having learned the destination and particulars of Heeslop's affairs, asked to look at his tickets; that Heeslop showed him the tickets, and the agent told Heeslop that the other agent had mistaken,
