gilance and activity; and it is the best introduction for any ufeful converfation which the giver of the book may wish to introduce.

She found that among the numerous wants fhe met with, no fmall share was owing to bad management, or to impofition: fhe was ftruck with the fmall fize of the loaves. Wheat was now not very dear, and fhe was fure a good deal of blame rested with the baker. She fent for a fhilling loaf to the next great town, where the mayor often fent to the bakers' fhops to fee that the bread was proper weight. She weighed her town loaf against her country loaf, and found the latter two pounds lighter than it ought to be. This was not the fort of grievance to carry to Sir John; but luckily the Squire was also a magistrate, and it was quite in his way: for though he would not give, yet he would counfel, calculate, contrive, reprimand, and punish. He told her he could

remedy

remedy the evil if fome one would lodge an information against the baker; but that there was no act of justice which he found it fo difficult to accomplish.

The Informer.

She dropped in on the blacksmith. He was at dinner. She inquired if his bread was good. Aye, good enough, mistress; "for you fee it is as white as your cap, if <c we had but more of it. Here's a fix

cr

penny loaf; you might take it for a penny "roll!" He then heartily curfed Crib the baker, and faid he ought to be hanged. Mrs. Jones now told him what she had done; how fhe had detected the fraud, and affured him the evil fhould be redreffed on the morrow, provided he would appear and inform. "I inform," faid he with a fhocking oath, "hang an informer! "I fcorn the office."-" You are nice in "the wrong place," replied Mrs. Jones; "for you don't fcorn to abuse the baker,

nor to be in a paffion, nor to fwear, "though you fcorn to redrefs a public

injury, and to increafe your children's "bread. Let me tell you, there is nothing "in which you ignorant people mistake more than in your notions about in"formers. Informing is a lawful way of obtaining redrefs; and though it is a "mifchievous and a hateful thing to go to r a juftice about every trifling matter, yet laying an information on important occafions, without malice, or bitterness of

any kind, is what no honest man ought to be ashamed of. The fhame is to "commit the offence, not to inform against "it. I, for my part, fhould perhaps do right, if I not only informed against Crib, for making light bread, but against you, for fwearing at him."

"Well, but madam," faid the fmith, a little foftened, "don't you think it a "fin and a fhame to turn informer ?".

So far from it, that when a man's mo"tives are good," faid Mrs. Jones," and

in fuch clear cafes as the present, I think it a duty and a virtue. If it is right "that there fhould be laws, it must be "right that they should be put in exe"cution; but how can this be, if people "will not inform the magiftrates when

they fee the laws broken? I hope I thall 66 always be afraid to be an offender against "the laws, but not to be an informer "in fupport of them.-An informer by "trade is commonly a knave. A rafh, ma"licious, or paffionate informer is a fire"brand; but honest and prudent inform"ers are almost as useful members of fo

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ciety as the judges of the land. If you "continue in your present mind on this fubject, do not you think that you will "be anfwerable for the crimes you might "have prevented by informing, and thus "become a fort of accomplice of the villains who commit them?"

"Well, madam," faid the fmith, “I "now fee plainly enough that there is no "fhame in turning informer when my

VOL. IV.

Z

"cause

"caufe is good."" And your motive

right; always mind that," faid Mrs. Jones. Next day the fmith attended, Crib was fined in the ufual penalty, his light bread was taken from him and given to the poor. The juftices refolved henceforward to infpect the bakers in their district; and all of them, except Crib, and fuch as Crib, were glad of it; for honesty never dreads a trial. Thus had Mrs. Jones the comfort of seeing how useful people may be without expence; for if fhe could have given the poor fifty pounds, fhe would not have done them fo great, or fo lasting a benefit, as fhe did them in feeing their loaves reftored to their lawful weight: and the true light in which fhe had put the bufinefs of informing was of no fmall use, in giving the neighbourhood right views on that fubject.

There were two fhops in the parish; but Mrs. Sparks, at the Crofs, had not half fo much custom as Wills, at the Sugar Loaf, though the fold her goods a penny