SHUT UP IN A FRENCH MAD HOUSE.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1037, 30 November 1882, Page 3

SHUT UP IN A FRENCH MAD HOUSE.

A strange story comes from Marseilles, the substance of which is that the son of a wealthy merchant, with a fortune of two and a half millions sterling, has for the last forty years been shut up in a mail house, though he is, and always has been, sane. Whether he is really sane or not remains, of course, to be proved, for the case will shortly be tried ; but the generally admitted facts seem to be these : Jean Mistral, when twenty-three years of ane, fell in love with the daughter of a Polish exile, and married her against his father’s will. The father was not to be moved by the entreaties of the young couple, and left them to beg their bread. As the marriage had been celebrated in Poland, he contrived to have it declared null and void ; and theiq after several violent scenes with his son, his doctor signed a certificate of the latter’s insanity. The young man was shut up in the departmental asylum ; and, though his father bequeathed him the whole of his fortune, there he has remained ever since. During that time his fortune has been administered by his family ; one of his nephews being the well-known Provencal poet. Thus far there is no difference of opinion, but while several doctors have declared him to be insane, one or two of h;s relations have taken up the case, and a petition addressed to the Chamber of Deputies asking that he might be set at liberty has been favourably reported on by the Committee to which the Minister of the Interior referred it. The Committee has advised the Minister to grant the prayer of the petition ; but this has not yet been done, and it may be safe to predict that the lawyers will got a considerable share of the fortune in dispute.