A Love-Lorn Damsel's Fate.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 4997, 3 May 1889, Page 4

A Love-Lorn Damsel's Fate.

It is a very peculiar thing what some women in this sublunary sphere will do if they are afflicted with a strong affection for a member of the opposite sex. An instance of this came before our notice this morning (says the Napier Evening News of Thursday last) when a neatly dressed woman of small stature and comparatively young, faced the Resident Magistrate on a charge »f vagrancy. Her name was Ellen Barnes, and she was brought up on remand. It appears that some time ago a young fellow, who was too lazy to work at his trade, or could not obtain employment, came to Napier and advertised himself as “ the Australian Blondin champion tightrope-walker.” He performed on the square opposite Wateworth’s Hall, at the time of the working men’s club flower show, but the amount of stray coin which he gathered from the public was not at all large, and he himself afterwards admitted that he was in a chronic state of impeeuniosity. Shortness of the necessary cash was not his only trouble, a new one arising at about this time, in the shape of an indignant wife. It appears that on his travels he picked up with a fair young lady with whom he cohabited, leaving his wife in Wellington. She came after him and charged him with having left her without means of subsistence. She then said that this other woman was the cause of all the trouble between herself and her husband. The resident magistrate said that the man would have to find sureties that he would pay his wife so much a week, and in default to be imprisoned for six months, in the Napier gaol. He went to gaol, and has been employed lately in assisting in the construction of the marine parade wall. Mrs Blondon No. 2, or otherwise,Bllen Barnes, has since then visited the beach, spending hours sitting on the shingle, watching her former protector breaking stones, and cheering him on as it were by her presence. He has been in prison some time and in the meanwhile the girl became enciente. To show the strong affection that she bore for the man with the broad arrow on his back we might mention that she would not do any work, and had to be run in for vagrancy. The object she had in view was to be near the man of her heart, but her scheme did not work quite right. The police were aware of the fact that she wished to get into gaol in order to be near the rope walker, and the matter was mentioned in court this morning. The R.M. was informed further that her friends in Wellington had offered to pay her passage to the Empire City if she would only go, consequently she need not be imprisoned for vagrancy. Captain Preece, addressing the girl, said he would dismiss her with a caution but if she were brought before him again she would be sentenced to a term of imprison ment in the Wellington gaol, as he would not be the means of sendins her to a place where the man was. She had already caused enough trouble between this man and his wife.