PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.
VOL. 109.
October 19, 1895.
"Poor little Dickey Birds! Dear little Dickey Birds!"
THE THIRTY-ONE-AND-SIXPENNY DREADFUL.
(By Mr. Punch's Own High-Class Police News Reporter.)
At the Grosvenor Square Criminal Court the case of Lady d'Edbroke came on for hearing at the head of the list. Interest in this alleged crime in high life drew together a vast galaxy of Society women, and His Worship was with difficulty accommodated with a seat on the bench. Opera-glasses ruled from one-and-sixpence-in-the-slot. The first charge brought against her ladyship was that of refusing alimony to her husband. A second dealt with the desertion of her children.
The prosecution undertook to prove that Sir Benedick had been found at night on the doorstep of the d'Edbroke Mansion without a latchkey or other visible means of subsistence. Lady d'Edbroke (née Swag) was described as the daughter of a wealthy Birmingham manufacturer of antiques. By her marriage into the ancient and honourable house of the d'Edbrokes she had relieved the fortunes of the three-and-twentieth baronet, whose assets at the moment had been nil. Two children had been born of the marriage, and these had recently been discovered in a state of emaciation in a Park Lane crèche.