MAN WHO FOUGHT AGAINST FATE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 33, 8 February 1930, Page 3 (Supplement)

MAN WHO FOUGHT AGAINST FATE.

A few weeks ago there ended, with the death In Germany of an old man of 82, a life story so extraordinary that it is worth a passing record here. Karl Unthan had the terrible misfortune of beins horn without hands or arms. As his parents were poor he might easilT have become one of those pitiful encumbrances on the face of the earth, a crippled beggar living on the chance charity of strangers. But he was, from the first, too good for such a fate. He quickly learned to nse his feet as others use their hands, and before he was eight he had taught himself to play the fiddle. This marvellous feat brought him a scholarship in the famous musical academy of Konigsberg, where he made such rapid progress that all his teachers encouraged him to become a professional fiddler and start on a world tour of concerts. But his modesty or his sense of humour made the boy choose a career less ambitious and less out at harmony witn his physical disability. He became, a music-hall performer. He drew crowds wherever he went, and soon he was a star of the first magnitude, with a name known In two continents.

His musical genius, coupled with his uncanny proficiency, brought him fame and a fortune, but his indomitable courage and his shining spirit brought him what he prized much more than these, a friend. , And what a friend!

On one of his voyages to the United States he met on the boat Gerhart Hauptmann, the great German writer, and the two men were so attracted to each other that they formed a life-long friendship. Some years later the boat on which they had met went down at sea, and this event made so deep an impression on Hauptmann that he wrote a novel about it and put his friend into it as one of the chief characters.

Time went, and after a while came the war, with all its curses, sweeping away all this brave man's hard-earned fortune just as old age came on. The last years of his life were spent in poverty, but this did not embitter his valiant spirit. The days which brought him an occasional letter from his old friend Gerhart Hauptmann were red-letter days to him, the only red-letter days, until that last redletter day of all which set free Ms vali-" ant spirit to seek new adventures somewhere beyond our ken.