A PITIFUL STORY

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 28 July 1913, Page 3

A PITIFUL STORY

DISTRESS IN INVER&ARGILL. | A more pitiable story of poverty, hunger and dirt could not be imagined than the description of a destitute family, which was unfolded by thVpo; lice at the Invercargill Court on Saturday morning. Sitting on a form was a weeping mother, »ttired in black and holding in her arms a bareheaded, smiling baby wrapped in a heavy red blanket. ' Seated beside her were three children. At intervals the mother burst into a loud wail and threw her head back as if gasping loT* breath, while a Court assistant endeavoured to relieve the widow's apparent suffering with a glass of water. The children were brought before the Magistrate as having been negleoted. A police-sergeant said be had been asked on several occasions to visit the family. During the last few weeke they had been practically homeless. The father ultimately totifc a small house, and when witness visited the house, the only furniture was a few wooden chairs and a broken bedstead with few blankets. The father was not there. There was only a loaf of bread,, a piece of cheese and a little butter in the,way of food. The secretary of the CJharitabie'jAid Board said hev interviewed the father as to the advisability of sending the children to the home,, but the latter said he could look after hia own children. Later he again visited !the house, and saw two children aWost naked, out in the snow. They were eating crusts of bread that had been softened under a water tap. The father of the children said he was working for the Drainage Board, and received 9s a day at present.' He was living with his wife. He had no table, and took his meals from a I chair.

The ..Magistrate made an order for the father to pay £1 a week. After, this decision, the mother, clinging desperately to her baby, said: "Dad, you need not come with me; I am going away on my own." The scene was distressing when the .charitable authorities came forward to take charge of the children. At first the mother held fast to the little one, but her arms were separated by a constable, and she yielded. Bhen, throwin her arms in the air, she lay prostrate, apparently in a faint.