CONTINENTAL CRIMES AND SENSATIONS.

Auckland Star, Volume XLI, Issue 31, 5 February 1910, Page 15

CONTINENTAL CRIMES AND SENSATIONS.

SCENES AT STELNTIEIL SALE. Disgraceful scenes were witnessed at. tho Hotel dcs Ventes, Paris, wliere a quantity of furniture, pictures, and other articles belonging to lime. Stelnhell's villa In the Impasse Ronsln were sold by auction. The sale-room (the London "Daily News" states) was crammed with a mocking, hostile crowd amongst which the "smart set" was conspicuous, and so great was tlio confusion and heat that many wonderfully dressed ladies present fainted. At one time the uproar had become so great that the auctioneer was obliged to suspend the sale for two hours. When It was resumed a strong force of police kept 'the excited, dishevelled crowd In comparative order, but nn u?ly rush was made to get out when at laet the proceedings terminated. Only small prices were realised, lime. Stelnheil's portrait by the famous palriter Bonnat was knocked down, to an accompaniment of hisses and jeers, for . £415. The grandfather's clock, which is supposed to have been stopped by the aspassins on the night of the double murder, went for £10. In all, the receipts fvom the sale amounted to a little ovur £H.m>. Throughout the seven hours dining which the proceedings lasted there was an Incessant din of laughter, hissing, stamping, and shouting, which drowned the voices of the few friends and sympathisers who were present out of regard for Mme. Stelnhell. THREE MOTOItBOiT VICTIMS. A tragic motor-boat accident off the Riviera coast had three victims, including Baron Didler Haussmann, son of the great Haussmann who rebuilt Paris under the Second Empire. The others were a mechanician and a sailor. The boat was quite new, and the managing engineer of the builders had himself tested it before delivery by taking it for a trial trip in a rough sea from Antlbes to Cannes and back. The boat did so well that he had no hesitation in handing it over to the baron, who started off In a calm sea from Antlbes to Nice. Nothing more was seen of them till at five o'clock at night two bodies—one being that of Baron l-laussmann—were washed ashore at Nice. The cause of the accident ia unknown, and the motor-boat was not found. TALE OF KING LEOPOLD'S MORGANATIC MARRIAGE. Mme. Bertbe Delaunay, representing the "Matin," travelled from Brussels to Paris In the same train as the Baroness Vaughan, the woman who King Leopold first ennobled and subsequently secretly married. She had spoken with the lady during the morning, and gives her impressions as follows:— "I found myself in the presence of a most beautiful and dignified young woman who. In spite of her humble extraction, possesses rare and incontestable distinction. Nothing revealed the adventuress or the self-seeking virago some people hay» described." Meanwhile, at the village of St. Jean, on the Riviera, a man who was a stable hand at King Leopold's villa at Nice declares that he accompanied the King and the baroness on the way to their mysterious marriage. He asserts that the ceremony took place at a little Franciscan chapel near Bordighera, towards the end of February, 100 S. The royal party motored from Nice. It consisted of the King, the baroness, au officer, 'the major-domo of the villa, and the present witness. As' he himself was not admitted to the church, there were only four persons actually present at the ceremony, which took place at midnight. A MUSICAL BURGLAR. Joseph AUweiler, Continental burglar, is passionately fond of music—a taste which has proved a drawback to the exercise of his calling. Some d.iys ago "he entered the Pension Roseuegg, near Lucerne, which Is closed during the winter, and finding plenty of choice wines and tinned food in the collar, took up his quarters there. The first day he spent In drinking champagne ond collecting the valuables In the house. Next day he was bored for want of employment, and entering the salon, struck a few notes softly on the piano. Then his taste and love for music overcame him, and he started playing through his repertoire. Neighbours who heard the music informed the police, and AUweiler was found still playing, and was arrested. BRAVE YOUNG WIFE SAVES HUSBANT FROM TERRIBLE DEATH. A bund of brigands who attacked the rail way station at Rosettl, a small Roumanian town, got a reception they little expected. Choosing the hour of midnight, they approached the station, which is desolately situated, and commenced their attack on the dwelling of the telegraph clerk, which stands some two hundred yards from the station itself. This offlcial possesses a terribly savage watch-dog, but the brigands silenced it by throwing to it dead fowls stolen from the adjacent shed. They then proceeded to force an entrance by a back window, thinking they had an easy task, the only inhabitants being the clerk and his wife. They reckoned, however, without their host, for hardly had they begun to force the window when n door was thrown open and a shot from a rifie stretched one bandit dead. This threw the others into disorder. They rnshed from the yard, the clerk ' following, but seeing he ■ did not fire again (having recklessly advanced without re-load-lng), they turned on aim with the knives j and axes with which they were armed, and I for a moment his death seemed certain, ■when liia courageous young wife ran forward and flred with a. shot gun with which she had armed, herself, and another brigand fell 1 wounded. Picking up their companion, the •

raiders, now fairly cowed, took to their heels. The clerk and bis wife, loading, followed them, . but unfortunately both fail in the dark, the band making their «acape. The gendarmerie have already arrested •ome members o< the band. They bave confessed their complicity and say that they threw their wounded comrade, still living. Into a deep well, being afraid, U they left him, that he would denounce them. The body has been since discovered.