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Lyttelton Times, Volume II, Issue 92, 9 October 1852, Page 7

A Strange Story. — The following very strange story appears in one of the Paris journals :—" AM. Macquart, contractor for slaughtering horses at Montfaugon, purchased a lot of thirty-three worn out animals, and amongst them were several which had formerly.belonged to the army. The thirty-three were soon killed, and the men proceeded to cut them up. Judge of the stupefaction of one of the men, named Matelot, on finding in one of them a small box of silver, containing a cross of the Legion of Honour, and a paper, in a perfect sate of preservation, containing the following lines :—' As I cannot survive the defeat of my Emperor, and as I have neither wife, child, nor cousins, I am about to get myself killed in alastchavg-e against those scoundrels the English, and as I will not let them have my cross, I will make my faithful horse Chateau-Margot swallow it. He will give it up when he can. ' Pierre Daboenne. 'Sergeant of the 2nd squadron of Red Lancers.'^ Matelot took the things to the Commissary of Police of the district, and that functionary allowed him to keep the silver box. As lor the cross it was sent to the Grand Chancellerie of the Legion ol Honour. From documents published by the professors of the Ecole d'Alfort, it aopears that certain horses have lived to the age of 45 ; that which Charles XII. rode at the battle of Pultowa attained that age. The whi:e charger of Napoleon lived 29 years. ChateauMargot is supposed to have been about 40.'; Gigantic k Eggs — The committee of nagement of the Jarden dcs Plantes of Paris have just presented to the Hnnterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons the casts i>t eggs of the gigantic wingless bird of Madagascar. These'enormous eggs are equal in size to twelve ostrich, sixteen casowavy, one hundred and forty-eight domestic hen, or fifty thousand humming birds' eggs.