A SAD TRAGEDY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10425, 24 April 1897, Page 2 (Supplement)

A SAD TRAGEDY.

FATHER KILLS HIS CHILD TO SAVE

IT FROM WANT At St. Ouen, near Paris, a shocking drama has occurred in a small cottage inhabited by a workman and his family. The man, a plumber by trade,had fallen into 111-health and was unable to leave his room. He was dying of consumption, and, knowing that hia days wore numbered, ho lay brooding over the want which, as he feared, would befall his family after he was gone. He had been an excellent hand, and had always borne a good character, and while his employers allowed him 21 francs a day, his comrades had on several occasions raised money among themselves for him. While his wife and elder children were at work or at school, and of whoso future he was passionately fond, he had frequently betrayed the utmost anxiety. Some time after his wife and the elder children had gone out for the day he staggered from the bed, and helping himself along by means of a rope attuohod to the ceiling for the purpose, locked the door, and, taking a revolver from the wardrobo, discharged threo shots at the hapless infant a 9 it lay in the oradle, death being instantaneous. The miserablo man then tried to hang himself with the rope, and, as it fell from the coiling, he had rocourse to the revolver; but lie failed also in this second attempt to take his own life. Completely blinded by the powder, and with a ghastly wound in the nose, he crept back to his bed, and, writhing in agony, shouted, " Murder! Murder!" His wife had just returned to prupnro the mid-day meal. Standing outside the door she shrieked for help, crying I out also, "He has killed my child 1" Two neighbours broke open the door, and, rushing into the room, saw the infant lying dead in tho cradle. "lain blind. Finish me. I am a murderer I" exclaimed tho wretched father. A large crowd soon gathered in front of the house, and when the police commissary arrived on tile scene of the tragedy the miserable man told him that he had killed the baby because he was so devoted to it and dreaded that it might be left " a prey to want." He has been removed to the nearest hospital, and the corpse of the little one has been conveyed to the morgue.