BITTEN BY A BLOODHOUND.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 130, 4 August 1870, Page 3

BITTEN BY A BLOODHOUND.

SHOCKING DEATII FEOM HTDEOPHOBIA.

A melancholy, and in many respects singular death from hydrophobia a(curred yesterday morning, at Yonkerp, Westchester county, where the horrifying circumstances are at present engrossing an unusual share of attention. To medical men it is another terrible illustration of the fact that although the poison conveyed in the bite of a rabid animal may remain dormant in the system for an indefinite period, its power to torture and destroy life does not deteriorate.

The victim, Thomas Lamb, who was in his 24th year, was by trade an engineer, and employed at a foundry in the village named, throughout which he was well known, as a trustworthy, industrious man. During last winter, while employed in a brewery in a neighbouring village, deceased was bitten by a ferocious bloodhound, owned by his employer, and although the wound inflicted by the fangs of the brute was not very severe, the animal was at once dispatched, and the affected part having rapidly healed, the occurrence was soon forgotton by the deceased. On Tuesday, of hist week, deceased was united in marriage with a young woman whose mother had bitterly opposed his attentions to her daughter. Having by the exercise of a little strategy realised their matrimonial wishes, the married pair had scarcely reached the domicile of the bridegroom, when the mother of the bride made her appearance, and after, on her knees, imploring curses and vengeance on the luckless couple, fervently prayed that her daughter might be a widow in less than three months. It appears that the diabolical imprecations of the mother had a most depressing effect on the minds of tho young people, and on the following day deceased evinced symptoms of the awful malady, the seed of which had been sown in his system some months previously. Medical skill was resorted to without avail, and on Friday, the wretched man, in one of his paroxysms, escaped from his attendants, and after reaching some open lots, displayed catlike agility in bounding over fences, and otherwise disporting like an animal. He was subsequently secured by two of the Yonkers police, who found it necessary to handcuff the madman, on arriving at his home in Bird-street. Either the sight or sound of water would throw the patient into the most agonising convulsions, and as the malady developed itself, he would bark like a dog, snarling and snapping at those who were near him. He continued to grow more violent and dangerous, so that many hours before his dissolution, it was deemed necessary to bind him with strong cords, and in this condition his struggles, shrieks and howls were truly shocking, until death ensued as above stated. — " New York Herald," May 18th.

Speaking of the want of employment for the thousands who are flocking to San Francisco since the opening of the Pacific Railway, the "New York Tribune " of April 2nd remarks : " Why should there be such a state of things in California as is indicated in our San Francisco despatch, by which it appears that the mayor has been authorised to give employment, on public works, to the numerous idle and suffering labourers of the city; and that these idlers, being dissatisfied at the mayor's delay in carrying out this scheme, have made several public demonstrations of a kind that caused fear of a riot? But why are there such large numbers of idle and suffering men in San Francisco ? Is it because there is no useful and profitable work to be obtained by them throughout the state? We trow not. In fact, we believe there is. no part of the country where, labour is in greater demand than it is in California to-day, and nowhere that it is surer of receiving a fair remuneration. But it is in San Francisco as in New York, where great numbers of men crowd into the city who are not needed for any of the city's industries ; they persist in staying in the city till they are overtaken by penury, instead of going where their labour is in request. Then, again, it is a fact that the business and industry of California are greatly injured by the extravagant demands that are made on behalf of labour, skilled and unskilled."

We learn from the Wanganui papers that the Kaikokopu estate hr a passed from J. Gotty, Esq., into the hands of David Peat, Esq., for the sum of £11,500, The property consists of 1,500 acres of fertile land laid down in grass, fenced, and otherwise well Improved, on the right bank of the Wanganui River,