MAD YOUTH’S FREAK.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 1975, 10 January 1907, Page 3

MAD YOUTH’S FREAK.

STARTS FIVE FIRES IN FLAT BUILDINGS. The New York police have arrested a youth named Frank Morris, who is accused of attempting to burn a large block of fashionable apartment houses in AYest Sixty-Fifth street, while under the influence of cigarettes made from stramonium leaves. Five different fires were discovered in the apartment houses, wherein four lives were lost, and many persons were prostrated through fright, while hundreds of others were rescued from dangerous positions with great difficulty. A big conflagration was averted only by the heroic activity of the fire department. Repeated alarms coming close together attracted a great crowd to West Sixty-Fifth street. A newsboy was watching the rescues when a breathless youth approaching hurriedly cried, “Any dead yet? Don’t go away. There will be lots of fifes to-night.”

The newsboy, noticing that the stranger’s clothes and face were grimy with smoke and soot, informed

the police. Two constables then heard the youth sneeringly declare to the bystanders that the New York firemen were not so prompt in answering alarms as the Boston firemen. “Wait until the next alarm,” he added, “and see how slow they are 1 ”

When arrested the hoy, who gave his name ns Morris, pulled out a packet of cigarettes made from stramonium leaves, and lighted one. It appears that he smokes dozens nf them daily until completely irresponsible. He seemed incapable of regret when informed that one woman, aged seventy-nine, died of fright when smoke filled her apartment, and that the majority of the members of eight half-suffocated families were taken to tho hospital.