AN ELOPEMENT CASE.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXX, Issue 12053, 22 December 1906, Page 6

AN ELOPEMENT CASE.

The commonplace round of gaiety in tiie life of New York's wealthy folk has been prettily disturbed by a boy-and-girl elopement on an elegant steam yacht, a marriage in midstream and a honeymoon flight into the Catskius by motor car. The boy hero is B. F. Hopkins, son of an Atlanta banker, and the bride Vera L. iSiegrisfc, jjrand-riaughter of a Dr. Lawrence, wtio made' an immense fortune by advertising patent medicines, and whose magnificent marble yalace ac 1060, Filth Avenue, we are told, is one of the sights of the plutocrat section of New l'ork. Vera ia only seventeen years of age, and had juat been promoted to long frocks. Tire boy was living at an expensive hotel, and had everything that money could purcHase. and the girl was in, the mid^t of a whirl of extravagant gaiety. Apparently their young- palatts were jadod, and they resolved on matrimony as the only escape from ennui. The boy, being plentifully supplied with pocketmoney, chartered a handsome steam yacht, which was fitted out in tlfe most sumptuous manner by the most expensive firm in the city, the main saloon bein? transformed into a tropical palm garden in the modern hotel style, the boudoir ox(■r:piti»ljr decorated in pale pink 6ilk. ■* hen >'' na-, in roa^mc.ss. *.iiss Vov:i •(•uclly valfced down the marble atepa of •nT grandfather's palace aud went aboard tie y:;c!it, which vad Iving '») the Hudeon with stenm up. She took only a few necessaries, including licr French maid, a Japaucse spaniel, a small bag of serviceable Jewels, and a school friend to act as chaperon. The yacht sailed up tho Hudson and anchored off Peckshill. There the captaiu went ashore and b'rougiit off a minister, and the ceremony was performed in the cabin. Landing higher up ihc river, t/ie couple fit:u'torl away on their honeymoon in ,i lutifo- c: ->> which was in readiness. It sm.ni.-> f!,a( Di\ Lawrence, having a higher financial rating by several millions than the Atlanta banker, regarded tho marriago as a mesalliance, and the _,ew York newspapers loft him angrily whirling off iv pursuit of the 6rtant pair.