NEWS BY MAIL.

Hokitika Guardian, 13 May 1927, Page 3

NEWS BY MAIL.

WHERE BLONDER SANG. VIENNA, .March 17

An international committee is being formed in. which British are prominent, to restore the ruined castle ol Durenstein. on the Danube, in which our King Richard of the Lion Heart was imprisoned in 1192 by Duke Leopold of Austria. Diirensteiu, which belongs to Count Sta rhemberg, a descendant oi the Count Starbenvberg, who defended Vienna successfully against the Turks in the 17th. century, directing his soldiers from the lofty tower of St. Stephen’s Cathedral with a megaphone, is much visited lor its beautiful situation towering above the Danube. as well as fair its historical interest. It was here, so the story goes, that. Blondel, the faithful troubadour of King Richard, played and sang beneath the window of the King’s prison cell, and thus gave him assurance of approaching deliverance, for Bi itisli visitors it is the most romantic sp jt in Austria. To what extent it is to he restored wilt depend very much upon Count Starheniberg, hut a. partial restoration could not damage its picturesqueness.

PHI LOM ENA POP UI AIR UAf. VIENNA, Ala rch 17. Because she registered in her maiden name when taking a lodging after her husband had been sent to prison for complicity in a robeory. Frau Philomena Populorum has been sent to prison. She pleaded that with her unusual name, made familiar to everybody by the publicity given to the ease, she could not get any landlady to accept her as a tenant. The judge said lie sympathised with her in having a name that people could not easily forget, but it was such a serious 'offence to register in a false name, or for a wife in her maiden name .that she could not he acquitted. JAAfAIED SPINAL CORD. ' PARTS. A! arch 17. An extraordinary accident took place yesterday during a Rugby football match at Perpignan. AT. Riviere, one of the Perpignan club’s best forwards, fell with one of his comrades on top of him. Tt was found that Riviere could not move and that owing to the position in which he had fallen the weight of his comrade on top of him had injured his spinal column. The injured player was taken to hospital and an X-ray examination slowed that tile spinal cord was jammed between broken vertebral hones.