An Impudent Matrimonial Swindle.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 294, 29 August 1888, Page 3

An Impudent Matrimonial Swindle.

Although 11. Naquet and his Divorce Bill have already liberated a fair number of ladies from unsympathetic husbands, they will (writes a Paris couespondent) hardly be unanimous in pronouncing 1 their freedom an unmixed joy. Certainly, wibh some of them it has been a ca&e of ' out ot the trying pan into the fire.' Here is a case in point. A young, handsome, and wealthy woman had scarcely obtained a divorce when she addre&bed herself to a matrimonial agency to find another mate. She wanted a man of family and good connections, fairly endow ed with this world's goods ; but the latter quaUn'cation was not a.szwe qua non, and, as the lady's dowry was more than ample, to say nothing o f other cliarms, suitors made their appearance in battalions. The lady, however, was capiicious, and one after the other the gentlemen weie politely sent about their business These numerous vibits attracted the attention of a couple of unscrupulous adventurers. They were both married, but this was a detail.' They put their heads together, and it was arranged that one of them, who was goodlooking and of gentlemanly appearance, should come forward as a suitor ; while the other should warrant him unimpeachable in every way. Oddly enough, the lady, whom none ot the other ' pretendants ' could please, stiuck her flag to this scamp, and at the close of the -winter she was united by Mon&ieur Ie Mair in the bonds of wedlock to the object of her affections. The honeymoon was of the shortest. Two days after the marriage the bigamist 1 bolted, taking with him, the dot, the jewellery, and mosb of the apparel of his victim. The lady, of course, was speedily in a state boidering on distraction, her tioubles increasing when it afterwards transpired that the man was not only manied already, but had s^ot into mischief %\ith the agents of the law. The police have ever since been searching in every diieetion for the bridegroom and his accomplice, but without any succe&s. This week, however, they were sentenced by default to five years' imprisonment, at the expiration of -which period, if they be appiehended, they will exchange this climate for that of" New Caledonia. The lady is once more a free woman, but she is not displaying the same eagerness* as before to pioA'ide herself with a new partner of her joys and sorrows ; moreover, her dot is sadly curtailed.'