PURSUIT OF WEALTH UNDER DIFFICULTIES.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2283, 12 July 1880, Page 3

PURSUIT OF WEALTH UNDER DIFFICULTIES.

Application was recently made to the Prussian Homo Ministry by the near relatives of a wealthy and eccentric old lady who died at Berlin early in February last, for permission to exhume her body upon the following grounds : The deceased, who, though she lived in a manner little short of penurious, was known to possess a large fortune in (Jovernnient and railway stock, had expressed, a few hours before her death, the wish to be buried in the old clothes she was accustomed to wear in the house and which she kept on throughout her last illness. Her relatives naturally complied with her deathbed instructions, and, after her body had been consigned to the earth, proceeded to take an inventory of her elfects, and to search for her assignments of scrip and other property. As, however, their anxious and exhaustive investigations bore no fruit in (he way of valuable documents they came to the conclusion that their defunct kinswoman, desirous not to be parted from her property even in the grave, bad sewn up her stock vouchers, and so forth, in the. lining of the threadbare gown in which they had laid her to rest. They have, therefore, petitioned the State authorities for leave to take up the miserly old dame's body, upon the chance of finding their inheritance ingeniously concealed among the folds of its mortuary garment. Their application has been submitted to the legal advisers of the Prussian Crown, who will decide whether or not it may lawfully be granted : and the result of the deliberations now pending upon this singular ease is awaited with considerable interest by the Berlin public.