The Anachronist's Cookbook

In the summer of 1872, a confederation of pickpockets plagued the streets of Manchester, swiping purses and leaving a series of pamphlets in their places. Only one child was ever caught at this, a girl by the name of Jane Sallow, aged fifteen, who managed her thievery though she had lost three fingers to a mechanical loom -- her remaining seven were not quite nimble enough to evade notice by her last victim, who snatched her by the wrist and dashed her arm against a lamp-post. During questioning, Jane wept piteously, tore at her dress, propositioned three bailiffs most lasciviously, and pleaded in the dulcet tones peculiar to young women for a prisoner's bread and water, being starved half to wasting. Her arrest is a matter of public record: little else in her life can be held to so high a standard. One of the bailiffs, called Roger Smith -- God save his soul -- succumbed to her wiles and embraced the wastrel child when the Constable finally gave her up for feral. When her bodice was unbuttoned, the hidden, incriminating pamphlets peeled loose from her breasts, still hot and molded to her body, and little Jane laughed in the face of the bailiff's desire.