“This morning about 10.30,” said the Chief Inspector, “we had a ’phone from Inspector Marshall of the Whitechapel District. He wanted to know whether we had had any recent reports of thefts of small jewellery, as he had come across some in connection with a scrap between two lightermen. It seems that about ten o’clock last night a constable on patrol heard cries coming from an entry off Cable Street, as if some one was being murdered. He ran down and found a man on the ground with another belabouring him furiously with his fists. The constable pulled the victor off, to find his opponent was little the worse. The fellow was really more frightened than hurt. The constable would have dismissed the affair with a good-humoured caution to both, had it not been that in the heat of the explanation
