A Strange Freak.

Manawatu Herald, 14 March 1899, Page 3

A Strange Freak.

11 Jack Tar in Petticoats " is the title of a communication from the Dunkirk correspondent of the Daily News, running thus : — Readers may perhaps remember anecdotes of daring women who have enlisted in # the army and endured the hardships of a campaign without being discovered. The desire to revenge a dead lorer or to fight Bide by Fide with the JQrd of her heart, might account for such an act of heroism on the part of a mem ber of the we»ksr sex. But who can explain ihe strange f.-eak of a woman who, in the p ping times of peace, assumtd male attire and signed articles to serve on a tramp steamer ? This is the story: — The s'.s Blaen avon, now in harbour from Norfolk, Va., shipped hey hands at Cardiff. Amongst the seamen there was a youth of 16, fairly smart at his duties, keeping watch and taking the wheel like a man, and during some twenty day3 the routine of the I ship went on a hitch. At the end of this time, however, there was a stir in the forecastle, and it became known that the youth was a woman. The astonishing fact was at once reported to the master, who without delay ordered the ventureBoms young person to be removed from the forecastle, and assigned her a private cabin. Op the ship's arrival at Las Palmas, where phe called for fuel, the female Jack Tar was left in charge of the British Consul, which she*stoutly resented, bung very drsji'ous of following the dntips of hor n?w railing. She declined to in ike known the motive that induced her to attempt so strange a deception, and her real id^ntitv is not known.