SPARROW NEWSVENDOR

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22388, 7 April 1936, Page 11

SPARROW NEWSVENDOR

MURDERED BY RIVALS LONELY SPINSTER'S COMPANION LONDON, March 27 An unusual murder, the victim of which was the most learned and popular sparrow in Budapest, occurred there, says the correspondent of the Times, as a result of the cut-throat competition of vested interests. The sparrow had been adopted by a lonely old spinster who had charge of a newspaper stall at the main railway station. The bird was clever, jovial and busi-ness-like. It learned to accost passersby, minded the stall when the mistress was delivering papers, and scornfully rejected buttons tendered by customers instead of coins. The bird's fame grew. It attracted hundreds of admirers and increased the business. Thus it aroused the jealousy of rival newsvendors. One day, when the mistress was absent, her small companion was trapped and wilfully murdered by "persons unknown." The Times honours the bird with a sub-leader, deploring the fact that the world's vast reserves of sparrow-power have gone unharnessed. Ifc points out that the bird followed a profession of which the late Edgar Wallace was an ornament in his youth, but was the victim of a murder surely more dastardly than any contained in the lurid pages of that great author's work.