ALONE AND INSANE.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 7533, 8 August 1903, Page 4

ALONE AND INSANE.

• A Sad Story. Melbourne files to hand by the last mail contain particulars of a particularly sad case which occurred recently at Kew, a suburb of the capital. The St.Kilda Council received numerous complaints regarding tho condition of a cottage in Westbury-street, and finally decided to serve the occupant with a notice to put it in proper condition. But this was no easy formality. Arrived at the house, tho official had to make his way through a masss of shrubs and creepers to reach the door. Ho was only abl- to _et ati answer after long knocking, when an elderly lady, Mrs Esther Layton, opened the door a mere chink and received the notice. The order was not complied with, yhenjthe authorities commenced to make enquiries. They found that a quarter of a p'entury ago two Misses Layton came to live in the house. They never became intimate with their neighbour?, and little was known of them except that they v/ere well born, and were considered eccentric. Some years ago tbe elder sister died, and since then Miss Esther Layton, now fifty-four years of age, had lived almost as S- recluse. Tho only person with whom she was on spe__2o Wins was a little girl who received a penny every day for going errands for te..' '

Many people regarded JVCisa Layton with feelings of slight fear, and the children of the street alternately tormented her and ran away from her. Tlie police accordingly assumed that she Was Insane, and procured a warrant for her examination. A sergeant and a medical man proceeded to carry it out. The dp,ctpr Batisged himself that she was insane, and a warrant was taken out for her arrest. The removal from the cottage was a painful incident. Miss Layton shrieked piteously, and called upon her dead mother for assistance. " Mamma, come to me 1 " she sobbed, "i'hey are tajricg mo away from my home, my beautiful home! " Examination of the house revealed an extraordinary contrast between the squalor and ruin of the place itself and

the va'uo and daintiness of its furnishings, the ordinary furniture was coarse and poor, but on the rotting floors thero were two costly pianos and dainty inlaid cabinets and easels of a century ago. In the cabinets were five collections of jewellery—pearl, agate and gold—of oldfashioned design, and of considerable value, and on a set of rough book ehelves wero dozens of elegantly-bound volumes.

The cottage was in a dreadful condition of ruin. The floors had rotted, and the rain, leaking through the roof, had gathered in pools between the fragments of flooring. Torn paper hung in shreds from the damp walls, and every corner of the ceilings was filled with huge masses of cobwebs.

The medical opinion was that although Miss Layton had been perfectly harmless up to tho present, she was subject to fits of violence, and could not be trusted. She was committed to an asylum, but correspondents in the papers have demanded that Bhe shall be released and allowed to live in retirement with a speoial attendant. At present, certainly, it seems to be unnecessary to subject her to the painful surroundings of an asylum.