THE TICHBORNE CASE.

Evening Star, Issue 7281, 4 August 1887, Page 3

THE TICHBORNE CASE.

COMING OF AGE OF THE RIGHTFUL HEIR. [From Our Special Correspondent.] London, June 15. All Hampshire is en fete this week celebrating the coming of age of the rightful heir to the Tichborne estates. Rich and poor from one end of the county to the other have been invited to take part in the rejoicings, and the merrymaking will conclude to-morrow with a colossal garden party in Tichborne Park. If young Sir Henry is—as his appearance would suggest —of a reflective turn of mind, he must have had the wherewithal for meditation as he stood on his lawn last Tuesday morning the unquestioned master of that goodly estate. In his infancy, ns we all know, he had the narrowest possible squeak of losing it. The prospects of the man of to-day arc very different to those of the child of May 11, 1871. There were not many people then who would have given L 5 for little Henry’s chance of inheriting the rich Tichborne estates. Popular feeling and popular opinion were alike favorable to the burly, confident colonial Claimant from New South Wales. The latter’s alleged adventures were too delightfully strange and romantic not to be true. Society took “Sir Roger” up, and for a brief—too brief—period the ex-butcher from Wagga Wagga tasted all the delights rank and wealth can afford. Among Hie tenants who cheered young Sir Henry Tiohborne so loudly on Tuesday morning, were there any, I wonder, who gave a thought to the broken-down old man now dragging out a dishonored, poverty-stricken age somewhere in the Far West. According to report, you may remember, several of the tenants on the estate not only recognised but publicly acknowledged “ Sir Roger.” Probably, however, they were got rid of long ago. It was hoped, I may mention, to crown the present coming-of-age festivities with the production o£ a &ta.tcmcut signed by the Claimant, and confessing his fraud. To this end the old man—who is now in the direst poverty—was sought out and offered a comfortable annuity 3 ho would only tell the truth. Ho declined the proposal with much anger and not a little dignity; in fact, the discomfited envoy could only come to the conclusion that Sir Roger, like many other impostors, has ended by believing in his own pretensions.