The convictions of railway passengers summoned at London and suburban courts for travelling without paying their fares are too numerous to be chronicled, but a really elaborate fraud, recently discovered and promptly punished, perpetrated on the London, Tilbury and Southend Railway, is deserving of notice. At Bromley is a ticket collector's box, and on a shelf cancelled tickets are placed. For two days a suspected passenger - a labourer - was watched. He bought a penny ticket to Plaistow and passing on to the platform each morning appropriated a cancelled ticket from the collector's box. He travelled to Tilbury and alighting paid a penny excess fare, saying he had come from Grays. In the evening he got on the platform with a penny ticket to Grays, and with the stolen ticket travelled back to Bromley. The defendant was fined 20 shillings and 6s costs, in each case.
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