STAGE STRUCK MAIDENS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVI, Issue 130, 17 June 1885, Page 2

STAGE STRUCK MAIDENS.

itAxit They wee Swindled by Bogus ; Agents. ;

(by telegraph—own correspondent.)

Dunedin, this day. Some time ago an ,idvorti?emont appeared in the Dunedin newspapers inviting young women ambitious of earning a livelihood and making a name for themselves on the stago to call upon a couple of gentlemen at a cortain address. Tho latter rcpiesonted that they had a commission from Messrs Williamson, Garner, and Muegrovo to engugc 20 young ladies in New Zealand as actresses, and that they had authority to defray their passages by steamer. From information already to hand, the enterprising agents met with a tolerable amount of success, After depicting bright prospects oi a career on the stage to applicants, they invariably torminated tho interviews by demanding, as a guaranteo that tho girls would carry out their suggestions, one guinea, assuring the girls that on their arrival iv Melbourne the money would be refunded. Tho Tarawera, which left Port Chalmers on Friday, was, the ladies wore given to understand, to be their moans of transit. At the portpriortoombarking, they woro to bo mot by the agents, who would then pay their steamer fares. Accordingly a numbor of ladies joyfully took the train for Port Chalmers, but on arrival it soon dawned on thorn that thoy had been victimised, for the agents did not show up. There was nothing for it but to return to town, and there the matter reached the ears of the police, who wero first waited upon by an indignant mother. Messengers wero despatched to tho boarding-houso where tho agents had resided to make inquiry as to their well being, but the birds had ilown. During thoir Bt.y in Dunedin tbey had kopt vory quiet, being rarely seen in tho street, nnd owing to this, tho police have had to roly on tho descriptions of them supplied by tho victims. Two mombors of a church choir woro among thoso who mado applications in response to tho advertisement by tho bogus agents, and, but for the fact coming to tho oars of their clergyman, would also now be reckoned among those who fell into tho trap. About half a dozen young ladies owned up to having parted with a guinoa in consonance with tho agreements they entered into. Tho polico yesterday arrested at Oamaru a man answering tho description of one of the persons wanted, but on reaching town it was found he was not tho individual required.