PLAGUE OF UMBRELLAS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 9 January 1929, Page 5

PLAGUE OF UMBRELLAS

AN AUCTION-ROOM BARGAIN NINETY-TWO POR 16 FRANCS BEWILDERED OWNER’S SORROWS A story has Ijgc.il told of a merchant who by a- mistake iu the reading of a letter hall 203 apes 'sent to him instead of the ‘‘2 or 3” apes he had ordered. The following story of a Frenchman who had a similar experience is told in a London paper. This queer experience ‘happened not long ago to a man in Paris. He may be called Houplin. Happening to walk past the Hotel Drouot, the great auctioneering place, it occurred toi him to step in and see if iie could not pick up something cheap as a- Christmas present for his wife. At one of the tables a handsome umbrella had just been put up for auction and he decided to bid for it. ‘"Twelve francs!” he called out. “Fourteen!’’ cried a man in the crowd. “■Sixteen!” retorted M. Houplin. There was no other bid, so the umbrella was made over to M. Houplin. He paid his 16 francs, tucked his prize under his arm, and was preparing to leave the building, when he was stopped by an official who informed him that he must take with him all his umbrellas at once. “All my umbrellas? What do you mean?”

“The lot you acquired consisted of 92 umbrellas. If you. do nut carry them away with you, you will have to pay 50 francs a dav for . storage.”

M. Houpliu started by taking the umbrellas borne in a taxi and presenting his wife and daughter with five each, his mother-in-law his Aunt Fanny with another three, his Uncle Emile witli two, and the cook with one. What should he do with the others? He couldn’t very well go out into the street and give them to pass-ers-by. They would think he had gone inad. In the end the bewildered man had what he fondly supposed a brilliant idea. He hired a handcart, loaded his umbrellas upon it, and, taking up his stand at the entrance of the Luxembourg Gardens, proceeded to' offer them In the public at, three francs apiece. He thought they would go like hot buns; but they did not —far from it. Most people passed by unheeding; others stared and laughed, while some shook their heads reprovingly, evidently in the belief that he was trying to get rid of stolen goods. One man went so far as to confide his suspicions to it policeman, who bade M. iiouplin follow linn to the nearest police station. ‘'Hut the umbrellas are mine!” protested the unfortunate man.

“Have you a pedlar’s license?” asked the inspector. Well, of course he had not. So he was fined, and reprimanded and told not to do it again. After which he was told iie could no home.

Hut by that time .M. Houplin was pretty sick of his umbrellas; so, obeying an impulse, which he again fondly imagined a happy one, he shunted them all behind a hush and went on with his empty handcart as though he had never owned an umbrella in his life, let alone six dozen of thorn.

But another policeman thinking this an extremely suspicious proceeding, swooned down noon him and conveyed him back to the self-same police station he had been discharged from 10 minutes before. Here he was naturally received as a hardened offender, and it took him aii his eloquence to convince the authorities that lie was an honest man merely suffering from ton much umbrella, lie ended bv imploring the inspector, with tears in his eyes, to tell him what lie had better do. “The only advice I can give, you,” said that personage, “is to leave your umbrellas at some depot and omit to pay storage for them. After a lapse of a year and a day they will he sold at auction at the Hotel Droimt. and you will be unit of them for ever. ’

id. Houplin did as he was told