BRIBERY AND CORRUPTION.

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bility of honest Charley as the low-minded German Mmself;and vvhen we politely informed the Prussian, that if he hadmade such a speech in public Company in England he wouldhave been thrown out of window, he shook his head, and said,—" Oh, the ' dummer Kerls,' we would not the best man amongus trust any farther than we could him see."

In order to probe to the bottom of this belief as to thebribality of the chief functionaries of Prussia, we asked theabove worthy whether he really feit convinced that it waspossible to influence the decision of the judges of his countryby the private presentation of some gifts to them. He turnedthe matter quietly over in his mind for some little time,and then answered, " That money would certainly go a longway in the Prussian Law Courts; but though he could notremember any instance of a judge having been paid to give acause against a person, still he was quite sure about the corrup-tibility of all the subordinate legal officers."

Whether such be really the case or not we cannot under-take to state; all we can conscientiously affirm is, that noPrussian has the same thorough belief in the Brutus-likeintegrity of the judges of his country that we have in Eng-land. Whether the distrust arise from the moral ignoranceof the people, and their consequent incapability of believingin acts of disinterestedness, or whether it proceed from a senseof the low tone of moral feeling pervading the entire nation,it is difficult to decide; but that the suspicion generally, if notuniversally, exists, must be known to all who have lived forany time among the Germans.

The members of the Prussian police, howevor, certainlyare not proof against the influence of groschens; this we canvouch for from our own personal experience, for even thesuperior officers of the coiys, if they have any business totransact for you,—and the police manage all things in Prussia,