A SAD TALE.

Patea Mail, Volume VIII, Issue 1000, 21 February 1883, Page 4

A SAD TALE.

A correspondent of the Dunedin Star tells the following sad story : Sir, —A few years ago, while sitting in the waiting-room at our railway station, my attentionwas drawn towards a well-dressed young woman with a child in her arms and another at her feet. She was sobbing and crying bitterly. I asked her if anything serious was the matter, and she told me as well as tears would allow that her husband had been drotvned in the bay the day previous, that an inquiry had been held that day in Dunedin, and.that she had been sent for to identify the-body. Several ladies present tried in vain to soothe her grief.' She soon told ns we used too much water, and added a little brandy would have a better effect; but we declined to try the experiment, seeing she had already got more than she could very well carry. So she told us to go about our business and leave a poor, brokenhearted widow alone with her fatherless babes. But neither of the little ones could walk, although one must have been at least three years old, and 1 soon saw that she was a cripple in every limb. I shall never forget the expression of pain that came over the little pinched face as I stooped and lifted her from the floor, having made up my mind, for her sake, to brave the journey to Port Chalmers in the same carriage with the drunken mother, who by this time had become very violent. A policeman followed her into the carriage and would have taken her in charge only for the sake of the two helpless little ones. I had promised to see them all safe somewhere, or give them in charge on arriving at Poit, should no one meet them there. It was a cold and stormy night, and the compartment was full of people, which had the effect of exciting the already half-maddened woman. No sooner were we seated and the train started than she threw the other child on the top of the one I held on my knee, and then she threw her disengaged arms around the neck of a man who sat in the corner, trying to scan a copy of the Evening Star. The man did not seem to appreciate this affectionate act, and cast the woman rather roughly off, which did not please her, so, after steadying herself somewhat, she. took aim and levelled a heavy blow at the man in return for the push he had given her. But it missed the intended mark, and struck a little baby only one month old on the head, rendering it insensible", and so it remained until the mother in great distress left the train at St Leonards. I spent the remaining time in watching my little charges. The duly was a painful one. At every noisy outbreak of the mother the youngest child would shake her bright golden curls, and clasp her dimpled hands in glee. But not so the eldest. She would throw her distorted, emaciated little arms around ray neck and shriek with terror. Her little logs hung down helpless and useless, and looked as though they had been broken more than once; her hips and back were deeply scarred, and legs, feet, arms, and hands were all disjointed and disfigured past description. It did not take long to discover that this poor child was a hopeless idiot, and I had not far to look for the cause. On arriving at our destination we were met by a well-dressed, respectable, pleasant-look-ing man, who seemed to take the situation in at a glance He very kindly asked me to go home with them until he could see me safe back again, which, of course, I declined to do. The man assured me that I would find no drink stronger than tea in his house. “ Poor Mary,” he added, “would be one of the best women the world ever saw only for the drink, and.that is her curse. She cannot help it; her mother died drunk while suckling her.” He had built her a house some distance out of town, thinking to wean her from her bad habit, and had no doubt of success, were it not for the way the law stood in allowing young children to carry beer for all who might please to send them for it. " His wife had been in trouble several times for sending her neighbour’s children on her errands for drink. Hotelkeepers had been warned again and again, all to no purpose. It mattered not to them so long as the drink was not consumed on their premises, and so the world went on. Nobody kenned and nobody cared, only the sufferers.

It is scarcely eight years since the above occurred, and yet where are those people now? I have good reason to believe that the body of the poor, man Was at last found drowned in the very place the drunken wife had raved about on the evening I first met her. The two poor little children I saw that night, also one or two born afterwards, all died, neglected and uncared for ; and it is not long since the body of the wretched woman was found dead by the roadside. Should any feel disposed to say that these stories are overdrawn, let them ask any of our own City policemen whether such things could take place around about us ; and many will answer they not only could but do take place but that worse things take place than anything yet told you by Rachel. Dunedin, February 3.