A MIDNIGHT ALARM.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 1 May 1919, Page 3

A MIDNIGHT ALARM.

Just as a certain suburban resident was beginning to disrobe the other night, preparatory to jumping into bed, a violent hammering on his front door caused him to slip on his coat again, and proceed to obey the summons. When he opened the' hall-door he found a young lady —a total stranger to him —standing on the verandah in a very agitated state of mind. As soon as she was sufficiently calm to speak she said that when passing a nearby clump of trees, on her wav home, a man had called out to her to stop, as he wanted to speak to her. Without waiting for anything further to happen, the girl bolted down the road, and made for the first house she could see, The householder ap>pealed to whistled to his dog (a very ugly customer) and proceeded to the clump of trees. Here the dog took charge of the situation. Rushing into the middle of the trees he soon chased a couple of rough-looking chaps out into the road, where they took to their hfeis and ran for all they were worth, the dog in hot pursuit. Presently Towser came back with about a yard of well-worn moleskin between his teeth. Presumably it had covered the ''head's antipodes " of one of the tramps. Ladies have been repeatedly warned not to be out and about after nightfall in Auckland unattended- But they will do it. A philosopher once defined a woman as " a creature that cannot reason, and who pokes the fire from the top." At holiday times, more especially, when all sorts of riff-raff are attracted to the city, it is not safe for any respectable woman or girl to be out and about after dark without an escort—more particularly qn lonely suburban r.qadfs.