Page:Edward Prime-Stevenson - The Intersexes.djvu/489

 would not result any tangible consequences, the young rascal accused the Englishman of violating public decency—and with a minor. He would not be shaken off. He ran after the carriage, sprang into it, and only at the door of the traveller's hotel leaped down, and ran away, not daring to face the concierge. The Englishman (who could not speak a word of Italian) was greatly disturbed at the prospect of a scandal. Fortunately there was none.

Another specimen of this kind of vulgar night-assault is as follows. The instance is reported in the Vienna "Neue Freie Presse", for June 14, 1901. It was much talked of in the capital at the time, as can be supposed.

But this was not the end. Decidedly serious consequences that brought victim and blackmailers in court, were to ensue. These developed as follows:

"In the purse, or card-case, was the visiting-card of the victim, with his name and address, also the coat-of-arms of his royal