Join host Corinthian Finn, a.k.a. Finn J.D. John 18th Baron Dunwitch,* for a one-hour-long spree through the scandal-sheets and story papers of old London!

This is our hour-long Ha'penny Horrid 'Hursday episode, the second of our two weekly shows. It comes in two parts, to-wit:

PART I: "THE HA’PENNY HORRIDS," 0:00 — 37:30:

• 01:10: DICKENS' DREADFUL ALMANAC for today: A Horrid (but mercifully short) account of a London coachman who received a particularly unpleasant, and fatal, Christmas present from his cher-amie...
• 02:50: SWEENEY TODD, THE BARBER OF FLEET-STREET, Chapter 74-75: Left alone in the shop, Johanna does a little light snooping. The parlour door she finds locked, of course. In a cupboard she finds a great assortment of sticks and umbrellas, along with a very fine sailor’s jacket, with what looks like a bloodstain around the breast. She nearly gets lost in maudlin lamentations over it, thinking it might be Mark’s. Then someone tries to enter the shop. She opens the door. It’s a messenger boy. He gives her a letter. …
• 30:40: EXECUTION-DAY BROADSIDE: The Trial and Execution of MARTIN CLINCH & SAMUEL MACKLEY, for the Wicked Murder of Mr. Fryer, in Islington Fields, in 1797..
• 34:45: TERRIFIC REGISTER ARTICLE: Another story of a woman unsuccessfully hanged for stealing from a housemate, who had framed her for it after she refused to sleep with him … who woke up on the dissecting table. In this case, the surgeon did not re-murder her, though!

PART II: "THE TWOPENNY TORRIDS," 38:00 — 1:15:00:

• 38:40: BLACK BESS; or, THE KNIGHT OF THE ROAD (starring HIGHWAYMAN DICK TURPIN), Chapter 41-42: The highwaymen watch as the miser’s murderer makes his appearance. It turns out to be a servant of the miser who had earlier stolen his gold, but now, overhearing his master’s curses and pledge to hunt down and kill whoever stole his gold, decided he’d rather have a murder on his conscience than a Nemesis on his track, and let the old man have it right in the chest. Outraged, Turpin and King pounce upon him. Dick makes a noose, and they fit it under his armpits and hang him up under a tree for someone to find, and they head off back toward their horses. Then, abruptly, the murderer’s screams stop, as if silenced by the hand of death … what could have happened?
• 1:01:20: A STREET-LIT STORY from an 1830s “broadside”: "The Female Sleep-walker,” a “catchpenny” story with a subtly sexual subtext.
• 1:07:50: A RATHER NAUGHTY COCK-AND-HEN-CLUB SONG: "The Frisky Country Lass,” which is one of those songs in which you figure out the dirty words by seeing what they rhyme with.
• 1:11:55: A FEW MILDLY DIRTY JOKES from what passed in 1830 for a dirty joke book: "The Joke-Cracker."

*The Barony of Dunwitch is located in a wood west of Arkham (where, as H.P. Lovecraft put it, “the hills rise wild, and there are valleys with deep woods that no axe has ever cut; there are dark narrow glens where the trees slope fantastically, and where thin brooklets trickle without ever having caught the glint of sunlight.”) Actually it is a good 3,000 miles west of Arkham. It is not to be confused with Dunwich, the English seacoast town that fell house by house into the sea centuries ago, or Dunsany, the home until 1957 of legendary fantasy author Edward J.M.D. Plunkett, 18th Baron Dunsany.

GLOSSARY OF FLASH TERMS USED IN THIS EPISODE:

• CAPTAIN LUSHINGTON: One who has alcoholically overindulged.
• OUT-AND-OUTER: A tip-topper or first-rater.
• KNIGHTS OF THE BRUSH AND MOON: Drunken fellows wandering amok in meadows and ditches, trying to stagger home.
• BLUNT: Money, with the implication that there is a large amount of it.
• BOLT THE MOON: Fly by night.
• MOABITES: Bailiffs.
• PHILISTINES: Another word for Moabites.
• NUBBING COVES: Hangmen.

There are more! But we’re out of space here. A full glossary of all the flash-cant terms used in this episode is at ⁠https://pennydread.com/discord⁠ in the "#season-4-episodes" thread.