A STRANGE STORY.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXXIII, Issue 9064, 3 February 1908, Page 2

A STRANGE STORY.

A young man named Ashton, who arrived in Sydney the other day from England, told a strange story to a representative of the Sydney Morning Herald. Acording to it, he won a competition in a London weekly paper, the prize in connection with which was a free passage to Australia and a guaranteed billet on arrival. The paper makes a specialty of helping emigrants to the colonies, and announces that it has “made arrangements whereby it is enabled to ensure work to suitable emigrants before they leave England.” It promoted a competition whereby the seller of the most copies of the paper in a month was to gain a free passage to New South Wales, a free kit, consisting of a suit of clothes, two sets of underwear, and a pair of boots, and a berth in Australia guaranteed by a toilet company. The young man worked hard, and won the competition easily, selling 2700 papers in nine days. He got his passage and his kit, and was handed a sealed envelope addressed to a well-known firm of warehousemen in Sydney. He had but a few shillings in his pocket, but he was certain of work on arrival, and consequently enjoyed the voyage. But when he presented the envelope to the head of the firm he received a rude shock. The manager handed the enclosures back, with the intimation that he could do nothing for him. One of the enclosures was from the manager of the paper, introducing the young man, and the other was a letter from the secretary of the toilet company, which read as follows: —“Gentlemen, —You would do us a great favour if you could employ the bearer as a traveller for our or other goods, or find him a position m any capacity for which he is suitable. We offered to give the winner of one of the competitions run by the a berth as our representative in Australia, but as we have now made arrangements with you we have had to withdraw that offer. Mr Ashton has, however, proved himself to be an unusually energetic and tactful man, and if you can see your way clear-to employ him we are confident you will'ueyer regret ic. ” Ashton states that this was„the first intimation he had of there Being any hitch in the guarantee, and the head of the firm says he knows, nothing of the toilet company beyond having had a few of their samples in the warehouse. The young manHoft the warehouse with exactly 6s in his pocket, but he is a man of grit, and took the first work that offered. He is reported to be doing well there, so New South Wales has got a satisfactory immigrant, and no doubt it is a case of “all’s well that ends well. ”