A DEATH-DEALING COFFIN.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VII, Issue 2152, 23 November 1885, Page 2

A DEATH-DEALING COFFIN.

_ The Antwerp correspondent of a French journal gives a description of a new species of coffin, for which the inventor, a Belgian, had hoped to secure a place in the Exhibition, though to his great mortification the Committee refused to allow it to figure among the other attractions of the tig show, The peculiarity of the "ccrcutt perfecionne" 1b an iugenious piece of mechanism fitted into whioh effectually obviates the possibility of being buried alive, The pressure of the earth'thrown the coffin liberates a sort of stiletto, which is bo placed " that on being disengaged it pierces the heart of the ocoupant. An idea prevails in France that the' mistake of burying' a living person iB by no means so rare an oceurrence as could be desired. The writer of an article which appeared some time ago in the 'Figaro' stated that it was an exceedingly common thing tor Frenchmen to insert a clause in their will directing their, surviving relatives to call in a burgeon to perform the operation which the Belgian coffin performs automatically. That apprehensions of the same sort are liqt uncommen in Belgium; tl)e veiy invention qf the contrivance' in question jshows, Had the cewieil perfeptionne been known in Meyerbeer's time, he need not have asked his friends on liis death bed, as he did, to bury him with a loaded pistol in each hand.