GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 2440, 13 June 1922, Page 1

GENERAL NEWS ITEMS.

The quiet- streets of a little town in France, named Yssingeaux, were the scene of a tragedy, when an explosion was heard and an old man, M. Felix Bourg, 77, fell to the ground. Bourg had* been suffering from stomach trouble, and had often threatened to put an end to his life. He did so by placing a dynamite cartridge witlfa time fuse attached under his hat. When the charge exploded it blew his brains out and shattered his skull beyond recognition. A lion tamer named Williams was recently rehearsing a turn with a lion and a lioness for a performance at a Paris circus, when the lion suddenly leaped at him and knocked him dowji. The lioness joined in the attack and the trainer was badly mauled, particularly about the arms and legs. The animals were driven off' by a hose. Williams was hurried to the hospital in a critical condition. The desire of chorus girls for silk stockings and new blouses has brought the opera season at Bayreuth, Bavaria, untimely end. The young women declared that they would not go on the stage in the evening unless their demands for higher wages and silk stockings, blouses, and shoes were complied with. The Corporation of Bayreuth declaring that they would not be blackmailed by a pack of chorus girls, dismissed them on the ground that they had broken their contract, and closed the Opera. When Wilfred Dovey was summoned at Lincoln recently for an offence under the Lord’s Day Observance Act by selling sweets, he asked the policemen if they reported themselves for summonses when they bought newspapers on Sunday. He quoted extracts from the statutes making it an offence to sell milk on Sunday between 9 and 4 o’clock, and debarring people who were robbed while gravelling on Sunday from taking action against the thief. Dovey paid a line of 5s on being told that , the alternative was a day in the stocks. The story of a life-tragedy was outlined at Essex Quarter Sessions, when George Scott Burrows, a man of thirty-three, pleaded guilty to an attempt at suicide at Southend. Nearly eighteen years ago Burrows was convicted at Northampton for the murder of his sister. He was their only fifteen and was ordered “to he detained during his Majesty’s pleasure.” He was sent to Broadmoor criminal lunatic asylum, and remained there for sixteen years. Then in 1920 he was released. He was found recently in Pier Hill Baths at Southend with his throat cut. “When he was admitted to Brixton,” said the medical officer of Brixton Prison, “he was suffering from marked depression, and in low spirits. Thei*e was justification for this as he had recently been released from regular employment at Broadmoor, and thrown on the world Mo fend for himself. He found uHlifficult to adapt himself to the strain and stress of the world o,utside.” Burrows was sentenced to twelve months’ imprisonment in the second division.