A HORRIBLE STORY.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 71, 23 March 1877, Page 4

A HORRIBLE STORY.

(From the Pilot.) The tavern of the "Golden Omelette" is situated close under. the fortification walls of the city of Radua. Its proprietor, TrouillesoD, is a man of gigantic stature*— an old soldier of the Austrian army, who was blinded by the explosion of a cannon while firing a salute from tbe forts of Trieste. Returning to his native city with his mistress, a fine-looking Russian woman of the Volga, he started the house of call for beggars, which he, up to a few weeks ago directed and made money of. The house is a long, low, rambling structure — a nondescript of brick, stone, and wood — and when descended on by the police, served as shelter for nearly, two hundred men, women, and children, all of whom, witb the exception of about a dozen, were professional'beggars. Upon the arrest of its host he was discovered to be worth, in money deposited in the Imperial Bank, over ,100,000 dollars, -ran enormous fortune for the country in which be lived. How this money was obtained was crowning horror of the Whole affair. Antoine Cherguille,, nicknamed " Jfae;,. Player," is the brother of Tr.Q. Ui&son's: mistrese. Among tbe frequenters of the " Golden Omelette," he is called the " Operateur." He is a man of over fifty, and for over thirty ydetfl i of his. life has been engaged in the business of. manu factoring, cripples. From: the evidence given at the trial, which is likely to send hita to the guillotine, his method ot procedure was as foi lows :— 'The members of a gang of, kidnappers, organised by his sister and her sightless paramour, have, for the last twenty years been engaged in stealing children from the various cities of the Empire. The unfortunate little ones, were brought to the head-quarters at Radna, where tbey paesed into the merciless hands of the " Opera teur." He took charge of them in a separate section of the inn, where, assisted by a cpuple of surgeons, whose vices had reduced them to his own level, und by bis own knowledge of anatomy — for be had studied the art himself io his youth — evolved the terribly crippled spectres who have so long pestered the pilgrims of St. Nepomuck. At the time of bis arrest, three children, in various stages of convalescence from mutilation, were found in the filthy cots of this demoniac hospital. One of them, a pretty girl of five, had her right hand amputated. The otber two —both boys— had lost their bands and feiet respectively. In a pit under the floor, in ooe oorner of the torturechamber, were found the putrifying remnants of a dozen human members buried in a compost of chloride of lime and quick lime. Cherguille manifested no emotion on his arrest, but utterly refused to render any information, and has been obstinately silent ever since. At the time the arrest was made, the business of the infamous den was in full blast. In the long common room a hundred miserable wrecks of i.umanity, armless, legless, footless, blind, and awfully disfigured, congregated about the long table. The smoke of their pipes veiled the scene, the reek of foul meat tainted the air, and tbe clattering of their crutcbeSjtheouraefl.siiriuks and loud converastion all about deafened the ordinary ear* Upon the entrance of the detectives they merely looked up, and noting the arttully disguised figures, took them for strange beggars, and continued their orgies without honoring them with any farther attention. The house had been surrounded with a double cordon of police, and at a signal tbe descent was made. The result was that all the frequenters of the place were seized, wiib one exception. Tbis singularly enough, waa a man without legs who managed to conceal himself in the cellar, and eventually made his escapes. Tbe prisoners were at onoe loaded into a speoial train and conveyed to Vienna. There. the promise of pardon induced a number ot them to a series of confessions. The art of crippling children was, it seems, not the only one' practised by the " operateur." More than one poor innocent had been wilfully blinded by (be atrocious torturer, aud at the trial three such victims of his infamous busiuess were produced. The money gained by these children was divided between Cherguille aud his sister and her paramour. The unfortunate little ones were closely watched, and no avenue of etcape left open to them; That tbe circumstances ot tbe case were not altogether unknown to tbe authorities at Radna is pateut from the fact that the Mayor and two other officials have been arrested for attempting bribes to hush the matter up.