WHAT THE LAMPLIGHTER SAW.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXIX, Issue 8, 9 January 1908, Page 4

WHAT THE LAMPLIGHTER SAW.

j No small amount of excitement was | caused at Parramatta on Monday morning (says the "Age") when it was bruited about that the body of a woman had been seen floating in the fresh water portion of the Parramatta River, and when, shortly afterwards, the police were seen engaged in dragging the river. When the facts of the case, however became known, the feeling of excitement gave way to one of amusement It seems that a lamplighter named Osborne ! whilst on his rounds about 5 o'clock j had occasion to cross the dam in Mars- ] den-street. When about midway his attention was arrested by the appearance of the body of a female in the water, close to the edge of the dam. To make sure he gave the object a poke with a stick which he carried for the purpose of . j turning down the lights in the street I lamps, and oeing satisfied in his own j mind that a dreadful tragedy had taken j place, hurried off with all despatch to ; j the police station a few hundred yards away to report the matter. A short distance from the supposed body, on the side of the dam, he had seen a woman's hat and some clothing. That seemed to confirm the conclusion _c had arrived . at. In the course of a few minutes the . police were on the spot, along with the I | lamplighter, but no dead body could be I seen, nor hat nor clothes. The police, j however, were so impressed with the , [ story related by the lamplighter that ; ; they decided to drag the river. They 1 did so in a most searching manner, and i after four or five hours' hard work they gave the job up, and concluded that the lamplighter must have been dreaming. But the fact is that the gas man was not dreaming—far from it. He only made a mistake in not giving the "body" in the water a harder poke with his stick than he did. If he had done so he would have found that it was very much alive. The "body" was that of a young woman who was merely taking an early morning bath, and seeing the lamplighter approaching she lay down in the water face downwards, and- remained still, so that ' she might not be observed. The prod "; in the ribs with the gas man's stick | nearly made her give the show away, but ? ; she bore it like a "brick," and as 'soon 'as the man with the stick hastily ' departed for the police-station, she " quietly got out of the water, donned her t clothes, and was far away by the time 1 the constables arrived on the scene with their grappling irons.