The above verse immortalizes an event that caused great excitement in
the period in which it occurred, although at the present date it would
not be considered of much account, or cause the smallest ripple on the
glassy calm of our most, sleepy village.
We have progressed beyond being stirred by any little peccadillo such as
the theft of a pig or a sheep, or even a watch or a purse, unless it
contains a large amount, and was taken under the most aggravating
circumstances from ourselves.
A robbery of a bank of a million, when it happens to affect hundreds of
people, or a midnight murder executed with the malignancy of a fiend,
will sometimes stir up the public for a few days, but even that soon
passes out of mind, and society settles back into its imperturbable
apathy, retreating with each wave of excitement still further, and
becoming by degrees proof against being stirred by anything that does
not affect ourselves personally.
Not so, however, in those days of Arcadian simplicity; for the
astounding temerity of the Piper's son, in laying felonious hands on the
property of the village butcher, or baker, caused an excitement second
only to a hanging, or a first-class sensational horror, of later days.
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