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Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3804, 24 September 1883, Page 2

Under the heading " A.Disgraceful Affair" our morning contemporary published a correspondent's letter, in which tho writer told tho following ghastly _tory:—"l

happened to be walking in the cemetery today, when a poor woman, frantic withgrief, asked me what sho should do ? Sho had had come to pay her Sunday nsit t» the grave of her little girl, who had been buried about a year. Since the burial the authorities had enquired if the parents intended to buy the grave, and tho answer was in tho affirmative; but being poor people they have hitherto been unable to do so. This morning the poor mother was horrified to find the grave of her child opened and empty, while the coffin had been taken out and lay on the grass out of the way." The above story naturally enough caused much sensation, and the cemetery authorities early this morning made it their business to enquire into the circumstances of the case. AYe aro most happy to say that there does not appear a shadow of truth in tho account given by the Herald's correspondent. Our information is to the following effect: A grave that contained the bodies of a mother and her two children had been opened to receive the body of another and older child of tho samo family yesterday. The last buried had been an infant, and it was necessary to lift it from its position to put the heavier and larger coffin in tho grave. Tho coffin containing tho remains of the infant was consequently raised, and with every care was placed beside the open grave, and covered with a sack. The burial of the last deceased was then proceeded with, tho coffin deposited in tho grave, and then that of the exhumed infant's placed on top of it. The poor mother frantic with grief has been many months in her last resting place, now her third child lies with her in the grave. AAHiere the Herald's correspondent drew his story from it is impossible to say, but some reparation is due to public feeling that was so outraged by his statements.