MODERN CRUSOE.

Auckland Star, Volume XLI, Issue 204, 29 August 1910, Page 6

MODERN CRUSOE.

THEEE YEARS ON AN UNTsTAjMED ISLAND. I (From Onr Special Correspondent.) a , t LONDON, July 22. j The story of a modern Robinson Cm- j. soe was mentioned in the Probate Court J on Monday. July 18th, when Sir Samuel 1 Kvans heard a formal application to : ' presume the death of a man named John \ Willis Kirkaldy, a trader in the South I.< Pacific. " ! i Mr. Powers said that the man cmi- - grated in ISBS, and traded in New Zea- i land and the Islands of the Pacific. He j s corresponded regularly with the members j J of his family till 1392, when he was I j wrecked on an unnamed, uninhabited j island in the Solomon Group. The President: A Robinson Crusoe. Mr. Powers: Exactly, and for nearly ! three years. He was there tiil a passing vessel'called for water and took Mm off: The President: Was there a. man Friday? Mr. Powers: Ohj yes in the shape of a j gentleman named Van Brun, who was j wrecked with him. s The counsel went on to say that the j two men were taken to New Zealand, I ] whence Kirkaldy resumed correspondence ■ with his relatives in England. When on t the island he sullered from ague, and in j one letter he said he had been reduced to ; a wreck, and was going to Sydney to see a i doctor, as the medical man in Auckland was a muff. He wrote again from Sydney, saying he was still ill, but that when he pulled round he was returning with Van Brun (who was then in New Zealand) to the Solomons to do a big trade. That was the last which was '. heard .of him. The President: Did he ever give an account of his three years on the island? It does not matter for the purposes of , this ease, but it might be very interest- j, ing. . ' Mr. Powers: Yes, it is very interest- ; ing. but it is not materials The descrip- j. tion was written on shipboard when he | was rescued, but it cuts off rather short j on account of want of paper. I, Counsel said that in one of the subse- I, quent letters he said: — At present I am an awful wreck. I have kept taking doses (of quinine) j on alternate days, and if I miss one . I suffer. I went to the best doctor here ; and he says I have got fairly burnt up j by staying down too long; and tlie only remedy is to go to a cooler climate. In another he wrote: — You said, "Do settle; you have roamed enough." Why should I ? j do not think I have it in mc. What inducement have I, a lonely man without ties of any description? In a third letter he spoke of having to go to Coolgardie, but he heard that j typhoid was prevalent there. A dose of ' that, he said, ou top of what he was j suffering from would about settle him, j and he "concluded, "I do not yearn for translation just at present." The President (looking at one of the letters) : There was a turtle on the island. The island was about fifty acres in extent. Mr. Powers: There is a long description of what ague is like. The President: But he does not describe the island; plenty of other people ■;ould tell us all about ague. Leave was given to presume the death in or about 1895.