STILL A MYSTERY.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume X, Issue 3286, 19 August 1889, Page 2

STILL A MYSTERY.

Kpkatau Disappearance.

Tbere must have been close on two hundred people at Kobtau yesterday (Sunday) carefully searching for the missing boy Thompson. Thoro is / still no sign of his whereabout—dead jA or alive. rW

Three brake loads of searchers went out from Carterton, and Ihero were in addition, numerous private conveyances on the scene.

Tho searching was conducted vory methodically. Extended lines of people about a quarter of a mile long wero formed, each person being about three yards from his neighbour; and thus marshalled tlioy simultaneously advanced closely examining all before them, and covering a wide stretch of' country,

' Soma of the ground in the vicinity has b4n so much ovcr-nin by tho search parties, that it is as thoroughly down-trodden as a road, Many of the original searchers aro beginning to lose heart; aud almost think that further search, which means again traversing the already oft examined spot, can be productive of no result. They say they are satisfied tho child is not abovo ground. That he may be in a water hole, but even that is not likely, as they have so tf closely oxamincd all these. A second opinion still believes in the idea that the child has been carried off by someone, while a few believe it even possible for tho boy to have got as far as the Enamahunga river, somo three or four miles off. Thcra are others, again, who say ihm ihe disappearance has now proved itself, to be no ordinary, case of losing, and throw out suggestive hints, which at presont aro premature, and as they can have no substantial foundation and only the propounded opinion

for their support, aro butter unexpressed. Searching will be continued to-day. Tho extraordinary alfair is, it is needless to say, rather gaining in the impression it is exciting, than losing in interest; and it is a subject of much discussion all over the neighborhood. Its only parallel in the Wairarapa seems to have been the case of a married woman who wits lost near Featherston somo twenty years ngo, and of whom no traco was ever found, nllpinjh scaich parties wuro out for wcjlcs.