AN EXTRAORDINARY CASE.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1897, 28 May 1889, Page 4

AN EXTRAORDINARY CASE.

The police of Ashburton (says the Lyttelton Times) have had a most distressing case put into their hands. Last Saturday two members of the force went up to a place called Koxburgh, in the Alford Porest district, for the purpose of taking charge of a family of young children whose mother is dead, and whose father, Jphn Rogers, is a small farmer. It had been reported that the children were neglected, and were living like savages. On reaching the house, the eldest child, a boy of 11, who saw the constables coming, bolted like a deer; and a couple ef hours' search on the part of the police failed in finding him. Three other children, nine, seven, and five, were, however, secured and brought into the township. The father had gone away on tbe previous day with the intention of being absent for about a fortnight. The police searched the house to see what provision had been made for the motherless ones during the father's absence. The search was rewarded by the discovery of a lump of hard bread and a bunch of carrots. Furniture there was virtually none—no chair, no table, and, worst of all, no blankets, while the earthen floor was filthy, as indeed was the whole place. The children were clad, if the word can be used in reference to what did duty as clothes, in dirty rags, the fastenings of which must have been cleverly constructed indeed to hold the tatters together. There have been some stinging cold nights already this season, and on one of the worst the children slept out uuder a hedge, with no covering save a piece of blanket. In the morning they breakfasted on raw turnips. Notwithstanding their hard living, they look healthy and well nourished, and are fairly intelligent children; but they have the habits of young savages. The father owns the freehold of the farm, and is said to be fairly well off. His wife has been dead two years. He was fined at Ashburton on the day his children were brought ia, for being drunk and abusing the police. On Tuesday at the District Court the police applied for the removal of the five children of John Rogers from his custody. Rogers was willing that they should be removed aud sent to an industrial school. His Honor read the father a very severe and said his conduct a 8 to the way he was bringing up his children was I a disgrace to the colony and to civilisation. Judge Ward said that if ever Rogers came before the court again in connection with his children he would very probably be sent to gaol. On the application of Pather Chastaguon, the children were sent to St. Mary's Industrial School, Nelson, until they had reached the age of 15 years It appears Rogers went up to the Forest to bring down the eldest boy. He got him right enough, he says, and put a chain round Mas, but tho lad gave him the slip on the way, and di-appeared in a plantation, no doubt making his way back to the j Purest and the bush. I