SACK-WEARING MISER.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 97, 30 May 1914, Page 3

SACK-WEARING MISER.

A MELBOURNE HERMIT. •Death has drawn the veil from one of those. strange characters who live hidden- in every.-society, anachronisms in this heyday of civilisation—curious, beings who abhor .the' brightness and; joyousness .of things and have a poor! world of their own, wrote the Mel-] bourne correspondent of a Sydney jour* nal. '..'■' • ' " ' ' 1 There is now no mystery about John O'Neill, except the mystery of the shattered love or terrible buffet from the worljd that drove him to his miserly hermitage; Bowed, dirty, and decrepit, the old.man■•..•was" always an object, of compassion .to the people of Port Mel-; bourne. They, having little to spare,; -brought him food and clothing, not knowing that lie had much. Pew knew -him, Hew cared .to know him. No one entered. his .*. cottage. Invariably wear? ing a sack -across-his"_shoulder, the old man, passed, about. the community an object of pity, arid yet one from which people shrank involuntarily as a thing; -apari from -their lives. They helped him—ror.'fancied-they did—out of a, spirit- of merc'y; but. they were as loth ae,he that 'he should be regarded as one of themselves.. - ■• .

He was-found lying dead across a box at , his house, and an inquest was held."' As he left no will and no rela:,'tives eame forward, the curator "of Intestate Estates took charge of his estate. " - *

•An "investigation is being made, of the premises by the-clerk in the curator's olfic'e ind'th'e plainclothes police". Most extraordinary is the spectacle revealed. The search will apparently not be finished, for several'days,-as the little four-roomed! tenement is so closely packed with merchandise and all manner' of fancy goods-that.it is "foundimpossible to' move aT>biit- c " without "first transferring the major,portion of them to.the back yard. Apparently the old','mai had not bothered about jeookiiVg, for the stove in/!'the kitchen * was covered with 'dolls and bric-a%rae.\ "■ ' ; A Queer Collection. To detail; the heterogeneous collec-tion-of man had crammed into the small- and.., stuffy, tenement—the windowa of- which do not - seem to have been opened 'during'the! term-of his occupancy—would take much space. 'But he seems to have had a particular fancy.. „for .. timepieces;, .for r instance, alarm clocks, miniature grandfather's- clocks, cuckoo:, docks, great and small blocks,- .calendar clocks, clocks of .-every .are. being, brought to light fromall. corners .of the-dust-laden..collection. Ink!.■ and _pens constituted another line in which he specialised.' ... . ",... ... ■- '-- •-. •■-■ ■

..: Great stone jr .jara of ink fluid are found- : glass bottles of "if in inrium'erapTe quantity are v * piled,, everywhere; and TpSns and pencils,, have''been gathered. - :; arid poked into, dust-hidden boxes by the gross?-; '*'''■■■'•*".•,'"•• ';. ; '"' ,,;; l ;• ' "''''■' ■';'■•■■ > ' '■■'.' Then there are sewing machines,