BRIGANDS OUTWITTED.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2135, 9 December 1890, Page 3

BRIGANDS OUTWITTED.

Tenimore Cooper, in his itories of hair-breadth escapes from Indians, never bit upon a more extraordinary device for eluding pursuit than one which was related to President Carnot during a recent tour in Corsica. A French traveller, so the Btory went, ventured some years Ago to pass through Corsica without an escort or any means of protection, and in crossing a particularly rough and craggy region found himself pursued by a band of brigands. As the traveller had some money on his person, and feared that besides being robbed, he weuld be held in captivity for ransom, even if he were not put to death, he took to flight. Knowing little of the country, he soon stumbled upon the border of a lake in the mountains. There was no path around < it, it was impossible to swim across it, and the brigands were behind him, though he was hidden from them as yet by the roeks. Whatever he did must be done in an instant. Necessity quickened his wits. He saw at once a way out of the difficulty and availed himself of it. He hastily cut with his knife one of the long, hollow reeds that grew on the shore of the lake. Then he stopped up his ears and nostrils with clay from the wet margin, took the reed in his mouth, and waded into deep water, where he remained submerged, with upturned face just allowing the upper end of the reed to project above the surface. On came the brigands, following the traveller's tracks to the water's edge. But what had become of him f Had he flown across ? Certainly he could aot have swam. There was no other way of escape, and the surface had by this time stilled to a perfect calm. The brigands remained waiting on the shore for some time, but no sign of the traveller appeared. Tl»ey concluded at last that he was a sorcerer, who had caused himself to vanish into the air. They then disappeared, and the Frenchman who had been under water all this time, breathing through the tube, came out. He managed to keep under cover and make his way to Ajaccio, and there he declared that he had been under water four hours. It is possible that his distress and alarm may have caused this period to appear many times longer than it really was, but in confirmation of the main part of his story, the Frenchman brought with him a water-soaked section of a hollow reed.