Bridal Tragedy.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVI, Issue 232, 5 October 1904, Page 4

Bridal Tragedy.

o SEQUEL TO COLONIAL'S SEARCH FOR A WIFE. BRIDEGROOM'S DEATH. Mr Edgar Wallace's search for ia| wife for a British Columbian colonist has had a tragic sequel. It will be remembered that some months ago, when Mr Wallace was engaged on a series of articles on "The Homeless Poor of London," a description of the life of poor, destitute girls inspired Mr Cochrane, a young colonial farmer, to apply to Mr Wallace for his offices in choosing a wi/j from among- those homeless ones. Having secured satisfactory references from the young man, (with a certificate as to his good character from the Rev. Mr Duncan, of Salmon Arm, Bribisih Columbia, Mr Wallace set about choosimgi the girl. The letters of the colonist were published, and has needs made known through the columns of the Daily Mail, and the result was that over six hundred' girls expressed their willingness to iga out. "It will be a Robinson Crusoe sort of life," wrote the young colonist, "amid the silence of the tall firs and tile everlasting snows of the mountains." Yet, in spite of the lonely life promised, the applicants were numerous ; not even the prospect of a 'og hut for a house and the isolation of their new home deterred them.

From among many applicants one was chosen. Three hundred might have been chosen just as well, so excellent were the qualifications of the girls. A cablegram was sent to the Hev. Mr Duncan asking him whether he would offer a home for the girl until she was married, and to"' this he immediately agreed. A telegram was sent to the girl telling her thati the choice had fallen upon her, and in response to Mr Edgar Wallace's request she called upon him the same night, and was given the money necessary to purchase a few articles for the journey, By arrangement with the Canadian Pacific Railway, the girl was to have left London to embark oh the Lake Manitoba for Canada.

Early the previous morning a cable arrived at the office of the Daily Mail.

"Cochrane died suddenly. Duncan," In this laconic message from the kindly pastor of Salmon Arm is the shattering of the poor girl's hopca With her scanty trousneau all ready for embarkation within a few days of her romantic wedding, the lover she has never seen, the husband she has never met, dies suddenly in all "th? loneliness of the Rockies, amid the siHnce of the- taljl firs," as he himself described It.