DELIRIOUS BOY

Evening Post, Issue 37, 12 August 1936, Page 16

DELIRIOUS BOY

MISSING FROM HOME

FOUND ASLEEP UNDER

HEDGE

! (By Telegraph.—Press Association.l | AUCKLAND, August 11. Delirious with influenza, Milton John Double, the nine-year-old son of Mr. and Mrs. G. Double, of. Avondale, jumped through the glass of a -window at about 11.30 o'clock on Monday night, and, in spite of an extensive search by neighbours and the police, was not found until 6.30 o'clock.this morning, when he was discovered asleep under a hedge. He was subsequently admitted to Auckland Hospital suffering from pneumonia. The boy returned home from school on Monday afternoon suffering from influenza, and was put to bed, but Mrs. Double did not consider his condition serious. He showed no signs of delirium, but at 11.30 o'clock Mr. and Mrs. Double were aroused by loud noises in the bathroom. "It sounded like two men fighting, but then I heard the crash of glass and the sound of familiar footsteps, which I recognised as those of Milton, running round to the front of the house," said Mrs. Double." The boy had evidently, left his bed without disturbing his elder brother, who was sleeping in the same room, gone through to the back of the house, and had made a noise in the bathroom when climbing on to the ledge by the window. . In breaking the window, which is about six feet from the ground, he cut his arm slightly. ... -Neighbours' were aroused, and within a short' time between twenty and thirty people were engaged in a search for the missing boy. Towards dawn it was realised nothing could be done in the dark, and the search was halted until daylight. At 6.30 the boy was found, only a few hundred yards from home sleeping under a hedge, where he was covered by long grass. He •night have been passed unnoticed many times during the night.