A STOWAWAY EIGHT DAYS IN A PACKING CASE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VII, Issue 2131, 28 October 1885, Page 2

A STOWAWAY EIGHT DAYS IN A PACKING CASE.

The Adelaide correspondent of the Melbourne Telegraph send the following statement mado by William Anderson, who was stowed away in a case for eight days in the hold of the South Australian (s.)" I will tell you everything but the name of the person who put me on board the ship at Fremantle. When they put me on board the vessel, and I was being lowered into the hold, I fancied I was going to the infernal regions straight away. 1 wa§ piit infcq the box at shortly after'U o'plook on Thursday morning, the Ist of October. I remember the time very well, as a few minutes previously I had a drink -of ale in an hotel. (Tuniin« to a police constable, who was standing close by, the man said; 1 For goodness sake get me a drink of water; surely water is cheap enough;' but upon being denied this luxury by the policeman, who told him that it would injure him to drink too much after being without it for so long, he again became calm and resumed his story.) I had been in the box twq (Jayq, when J thought-J would try and get out. I managed to get the tqe'of my 'b'qot between'the cover and tl)o end of the box', and using it as a lever, I succeeded in moving' two large packages, which bad been stacked qn top of my cage, and forced the qover up abpi)t 18 inches. I then sat straight up in the box, and allowed my feet to hang out of the end. Whilst in this attitude

the hatches were taken off, and some sailors came into the hold to take out 'a couple of packages of cargo, and 1 had \b hurry back to my miserable bunk; from this time until- I arrived in Port Adelaide the cover of my box was never lifted; I lighted a candle on one occasion to look what time it was by my watch, and I was nearly stifled by the heat, I took 2£ib of ship's biscuits with me into the box at Perth, but I found that I could not eat them. They made my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, and I Buffered fearful agony from thirst." (Anderson again stopped short in his tale, and cried out pitifully for water, upon which he was again told of the danger of drinking too much, and the policeman supplied him with a pannikin of bread and milk. On receiving . this he said, 11 What is tho good pf this J'' stuff to a man who is dying of thirst.") He, however, eagerly seized the nourishment, and would have emptied the can at a single gulp had he not been prevented from doing so by the constable in charge, He was told to sip the food in spoonfuls, and he tried every artifice he knew to get the policeman to leave his side for a moment, so as to allow Jjim to have a good drink, but all to nofißpose. He then continued: " Once ('""'twice while in the box I kicked at thf .'corner and sides to let someone know of my confinement, but I could not have been heard. The exertion made me very weak. I had means of boring holes in tho sides of the box if I required ventilation. I held the cover down by a chord attached to the underpart. I was knocked about frightfully in being put into the hold, and I was toppled head over heels several times. I could do a good long drink of water, or any other liquid, A bottle of colonial ale would be my fancy, and a bucketful of water after it. Why won't somebody give me something to quench' my thirst after being without water for all these days ?" (Seeing a pump at the end of the yard he pleaded hard to be allowed to go to it for a minute, but was properly denied.) On being interrogated as to whether he came under the provisions of tho new tariff, he said, " They can't charge me with Btow- j ing myself away, asl was shipped a 8 cargo. I gave the man who did the job £2 for his trouble. I have been in a good many scrapes in my life, but this is the worst of all, and I thmk I am pretty fortunate in getting out of it so easily. Tho revolver which I brought with m« might prove useful in "this colony, as there is a man living here who robbed me once. I used to be a soldier, and I fought in four battles before I was twenty years of age."