The Capture of a Duke by Brigands.

Te Aroha News, Volume I, Issue 40, 8 March 1884, Page 4

The Capture of a Duke by Brigands.

Fiiom Naples it is reported that the brigands who captured the Duke of Calvino on the evening of November 4 in the neighbourhood of Trapani, of Sicily, released him on payment of a ransom of 150,000fr by his taraily, who never expected to see him alive again, he beingvery obese, advanced in age, and afflicted with a nervous malady. He has passed 35 days with the brigands, and, strange tosay, the treatment he had received, though by no means pleasant, had the effect for a time of curing him. The duke related that in the night when he was taken he was put on horseback, and made to ride till next morning, when the brigands stopped at a kind of warehouse. There he remained the first day, and wrote, at his captors' dictation, a letter to his family, asking them to send the above-mentioned ransom. In the evening the journey was resumed, and as the rain was falling in torrents the duke was clad in some tarpaulins, and a sack was placed over his head to protect him. The second night the party reached an abandoned shed, wore the duke was left, with a guard outside the door. The third night the journey was ended at the place destined before-hand for tho duke's concealment. He had to enter this retreat on hands and knees, through a narrow opening, into a cave, and then through a second holo in*"O a subterranean grotto. Here ho remained for 30 days without any light, lying on a bundle of straw which was never changed. His food consisted of bread and cheese and water. Tho brigands left him alone, only returning to bri»g food. By the light of a lamp, which was lowered from above, they forced him to write other pressing letters to his family, and dictated whatho should say. His family, to obtain his release, used their utmost inilnenco to prevent tho military authorities from pursuing the brigands until the ransom had been safely paid and received. The band liberated their victim after having conducted him on foot for a considerable distance to the territory of Castellamarc, where a peasant's house had been indicated to him, whence ho would bo conducted by the inmates to Trapani, about twenty miles distant.