THEFT OF A HORSE.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIV, Issue 204, 27 August 1913, Page 6

THEFT OF A HORSE.

ESCAPADE BY TWO BOTS. A?r AVONDALE RffiTOBNT. Two boys just urnler li> years <xf age, one a Kiiropcan and one a'Maori. canio before CUr. F. V. Fraxox. &M., in the Juvenile Court this morning, charged with horee-stciUing. The ciroumstmKTs explained wpro that tbo European lad had a row with hi* mother at nls home at AvondaJc, and in a. fit of pique decided to leave homo. lie borrowed a saddle and bridle, jwid went out to catch his own horse to ride away. He could not catch the horse, «o he went to another paddock, and caught another man's horse. Just then the Maori boy, whose liome was at Tc Kuiti, cimn alorrs,', unci the two of them set out, double-banking the steed, for th« Kinp Country. At Afc.rcer, the European boy sold tin- hor«e to a native for £3, frfvinji a receipt in a false name, and ho and his friend went on to Tβ Kiiiti, where the Maori boy stayed with hia people, and the other lad lived with a native family. A few days later the latter hoard that the police were on his track, and he cleared out, taking with liim a pea-rifle belonging; to the fx-oplr with whom be was staying. TIo sold the rifle for 10/, and went on hia way, but was eanght a few miles oxit from Te Kuiti. The Ttonori boy said that lie was not with the other lad when he took the horse, and he didn't get any of the proceede of its sale. Mr. M. D. Mahony said th*t the young Enropean's father had recently been killed, and the i>oy hud been apprenticed to a 'blacksmith. His chief faults were the inordinate smoking of cigarettes at times, and the reading of penny dreadfuls. The la-d was committed to Bnrnbam Industrial School, and his Maori companion was admonished and discharged.