cause death. The residue of the package was found to consist of Epsom salts, magnesia, and strych nine. The prisoner had access to all parts of the workhouse, and had been seen in the surgery some short time previous to Easter, with a paper before him containing a white powder, into which he appeared to be pouring another white powder from a bottle. In this surgery the Epsom salts and magnesia were kept in open drawers, and strychnine was most culpably kept in an unlocked press. The physician to the workhouse stated that in the beginning of March the prisoner had a conversation with him about poisons, in which the doctor informed him of the nature and properties of strychnine, and that half a grain of it would be a fatal dose. The circumstances of Mrs. Burke's death were proved by her sister, niece, and servant. Dr. Harrington identified the bottle of turpentine as having been sent from his establishment, and proved that the package of white powder had not been made up by any medical man, the materials being merely mixed together, instead of being triturated in a mortar. After a trial of two days, the case was so clearly proved that the jury immediately returned a verdict of Guilty-yet, strange to say, they recommended the prisoner to mercy on account of his previous good character. He was executed on the 25th August.

27. DESTRUCTION OF THE "GOLDEN GATE."-FRIGHTFUL Loss OF LIFE. Intelligence has been received of the destruction by fire of the American steamer Golden Gate, while on her voyage from San Francisco to Panama. The Golden Gate was a very large and powerful steamer. She left San Fran

cisco on the 21st July, with 95 cabin passengers, 147 second-class passengers, and a crew of 96 men. She had also an immense treasure of 1,400,000 dollars. On the 27th, while 15 miles westward of Manzanilla, she was found to be on fire in the engine-room. She was promptly headed for the shore, which fortunately was but 3 miles distant. The passengers were ordered to the forepart of the ship, which was as yet free from the flames; but the fire spread with such rapidity that the communication with the stern was cut off, and great numbers were burnt to death bebefore the ship was run on the beach. When this was accomplished it seemed that the unhappy voyagers had only changed the manner of their death; for a dreadful surf broke upon the shore and rendered the chance of escape precarious. But there was no choice. Every part of the ship was on fire, and the despairing people were compelled to entrust themselves to the waves. Very many perished; some got to land burnt and shattered; the shore was lined with corpses. When assistance arrived, and those who had reached the shore were collected together, it was found that 72 of the passengers and 62 of the crew survived. Those who perished, or were missing, were in number 204. The ship was utterly destroyed by the combined action of the fire and the breakers. By the total destruction of the framework, the massive iron boxes which contained the treasure sunk into the sand, whence a considerable portion has been recovered by means of dredging and the diving appa

ratus.

30. MURDER OF MR. BRADDELL AT TIPPERARY.-A murder, not of

atrocity beyond other Irish assassinations, but having its distinguishing characteristics, has followed close upon those of Mr. Thiebault, Mr. Fitzgerald, and Mr. Herdman. The victim in this case was one of the obnoxious class of landlords' agents. Mr. Braddell was a highly-respectable solicitor of Mallow, and was employed in managing the estates of several large landed proprietors of the district. The famine of 1847 had ruined many of the small farmers there as elsewhere. Their stock and capital were gone, their only subsistence was the potato, and that had recently failed; they were without means of paying rent. No doubt their misfortunes were great; but to leave the land in the hands of those who could not till it would have resulted in turning the richest parts of Ireland into wilderness. In consequence, very many evictions were enforced, and great misery was endured. It was Mr. Braddell's unfortunate duty to carry out many of these distressing actions. He does not seem to have been himself a hard or brutal man; but these qualities are indispensable to the persons actually charged with the performance of such offices; and Mr. Braddell's bailiff, Michael Hayes, was one of the worst specimens of the detested class to which he belonged. This ruffian was himself a delinquent towards his employer, was dismissed, and a person named Moore was appointed bailiff in his stead. In addition to his dismissal, Hayes had other causes of enmity against Mr. Braddell. His (Hayes') son had held a farm under Mr. Braddell's management: he had been ejected, and one Quinlan had been put in. Young Hayes retaliated by murdering Quinlan, and had

been tried for the murder, but was acquitted. Mr. Braddell had been a material witness on this occasion. Since then, Mr. Braddell had been in fear of an attack from the Hayes, and had always carried pistols. Now the enmity rose to the height, for Hayes himself had received notice to quit some laud of which he was tenant.

For

Mr. Braddell had given notice to the tenants on the estate of Colonel Hare that he would collect the "gale" on the 30th July, at the town of Tipperary. this purpose he engaged a room in Dobbyn's Hotel-a small apartment at the rear of the building, approached by a long, narrow, illlighted passage, and having one window opening into the yard. He was attended by the new bailiff, Moore; and a tenant, named Reardon, was speaking to him respecting some drainage on his land, when Hayes entered. He was much excited, and demanded to be allowed to remain on the land at the same rent as heretofore. Mr. Braddell made no answer. Hayes pressed his claims with great vehemence; and at length Mr. Braddell said, "I will have nothing to do with you." Hayes became more excited, and Reardon tried to get him out of the room; but failing, left the room himself. He had got into the passage when he heard a shot, and then another. The next moment Mr. Braddell rushed past him, saying nothing, but pressing his hand to his side. Moore, who had remained in the room, stated, that on Mr. Braddell repeating his refusal, Hayes drew a pistol from his breast-pocket and fired the contents into the unfortunate man's stomach; that he (Moore) attempted to catch hold of Hayes, but failed. It did not

appear that Moore had made any real attempt to secure the murderer, or had made a pursuit; and Reardon, who was not in the first instance aware of the deed that had been done, afterwards saw the murderer in the street, and had made no serious attempt to secure him. Mr. Braddell died the following day. In the meanwhile, the murderer had made his escape at leisure, and with no affectation of concealment. It is the distinguishing feature of this case-and one that shows how greatly the hatred against oppressive landlords predominates over every other passion in the breasts of the Irish peasantry that this man Hayes was held in unutterable detestation for his violence and hard-heartedness in enforcing the evictions entrusted to him-that he was of the oppressors that man whose hands had executed the most heartless of tasks in the most hardened man

ner.

But in this matter his relations towards his employer had been changed-from being the evil agent he had become the sufferer; from being the landlord's agent to evict he had become the evicted tenant; and by that fact he had become one of the people, and their sympathies were instantly ranged on his side. Hayes took refuge in the open parts of the country. A large reward was offered for his apprehension, and the constabulary were intent upon his capture; for the repeated escapes of great criminals had sorely impeached the value of the force. But Hayes baffled their utmost efforts. They repeatedly obtained information-sometimes purposely false of his hiding-places, and he was frequently seen. But though they formed a cordon around the whole district, connected by pic

quets within-though they frequently came upon his lairs while bearing still fresh marks of his occupation-he always escaped. Of course, this he could not have done without the assistance of the peasantry; and it is a remarkable proof of the sympathy which they have for criminals of this class, that every man and woman, and many children, occupying a wide district, must at one

time or another have been aware of the hiding-place of this murderer and oppressor, and very many must have given him shelter, yet not only was he in no one instance betrayed, but he must constantly have owed his safety to the ceaseless vigilance and timely warnings of the very people whom he had ground to the earth.

AUGUST.

was

1. TRAGICAL DISCOVERY AT COBHAM.-A very strange and inexplicable occurrence-which generally known as "The Cobham Tragedy"-has come to light, near the village of Cobham. This is a very secluded village, in the county of Surrey, on the banks of the river Mole. At a short distance from the village a bridge crosses the stream, and the road traverses rough unenclosed land, known as Walton Heath. Several roads cross near the bridge, enclosing a triangular piece of ground, planted with fir trees. This spot does not abut on the bank of the river, but is only a short distance from it. On the evening of Friday, the 1st August, three men, inhabitants of Cobham, crossed the bridge for a walk on the Heath.

When on

the waste land, they were struck by a very offensive smell-so bad, indeed, that one of them went into the coppice, and there beheld a horrifying spectacle-the corpses of two men, the one resting on the other, in a very advanced state of decomposition. The appalled spectators hurried away, and sent a policeman to the spot. When this officer, accompanied by numerous villagers, examined the place, he found the two corpses lying as described. One body was lying on the back with a railway wrapper over the face; the other was lying on the right side, close to and in a direction nearly parallel to the other, on the breast of which the head was lying. The bodies were greatly decomposed, and were covered with flies and vermin: they had evidently been lying there for many days. The clothes of both were undisturbed, and, so far as the action of the weather and the horrible state of the bodies would permit, seemed to indicate persons of the better classes. A strange miscellany of articles was found upon the bodies or on the ground. Two pistols, both of which had been discharged; a tin box containing percussion caps; a pill-box with two conical bullets; bullets loose in the pockets; and a powderflask; a fishing pannier, containing a rod-bag; a fly-book with flies, and some writing in pencil which had been defaced; gloves, money, white cambric handkerchiefs, and many articles of personal use. On the ground was a wine-bottle with the neck broken off, but which had contained port wine; and on one of the deceased, a flask containing a little weak brandy-and-water. The bodies appeared to be those of persons about 35 and 25 years of age.

It appeared by the evidence given at the coroner's inquest, that on the night of the 24th of July, two persons, whose appearance corresponded with that of the deceased, went to the White Lion, at Cobham, and asked for two pint bottles of port wine. The female who waited on them had no port wine in pints; upon which they took an ordinary quart bottle, and as this would not go into the fishing pannier which one carried, he took out a pouch, and thus made room for it. The pouch he left in the hands of the waitress, saying he would call for it the next day. The pouch contained a pair of scissors, tweezers, and some artificial flies. One of them had a rod in a bag. On leaving, they said they were going to Stoke d'Abernon; but they went towards Walton Heath. They were about to go away without paying, when the waitress reminded them: the younger paid. The elder is described by the waitress as appearing "quite lost." None of the articles contained any name or address, by which these unfortunates could be traced; there were initials and writing, but the latter had been erased. Some days afteron Monday morning-a little girl found the fishing-rod put together, and, with the line attached, leaning against a bush, about 80 yards from where the bodies were found. She passed on, thinking that it belonged to some persons fishing, who would return for it; but finding it still there when she came back, she took it to her father. After the bodies had been discovered, a woman, who had been attracted to the spot by curiosity, picked up a printed paper-a tailor's circular. She took it home, when her daughter noticed that

-

9

there was writing in pencil on the back, commencing with the words, "Whoever finds this body, . . The rest was almost illegible; but with the assistance of a lens it was deciphered, and found to be as follows:-"Whoever finds this body will confer a great favour on one who can never ask another, if he will take the gloves the writer wears to, and tell her that he died blessing her, and praying for her happiness; and the writer asks with his dying breath, that will love and he asks to be dearly for his sake; and he asks forgiveness from all whom he may pain by thus going away to die, but he is too unhappy to live; and, as the last request of her dying child, he asks his mother to love ―, and to take care of her as far as possible; and the writer most earnestly begs pardon from hist poor old father, whom he is sorry to leave; but fate is too strong to resist. May God bless all those who have been so good to me, and whom I have so ill-requited; but if my life were to be lived again, I am afraid I should do all I have done. As for my death, I die quite happy, and with a blissful feeling that I am going to rest. (probably naming his companion) is nearly dead. I have promised to see him safely dead before I quit-" Here the writer ceased, and no doubt terminated his own existence. In each of the blanks a name had been written, and afterwards completely defaced by the pencil, as though the writer wished, on consideration, to avoid giving the name any publicity. On the same day a small medicine phial was found near the spot, which bore the label of a chemist at Upper Holloway. On the evening of the 24th, between seven and eight

o'clock, this woman heard two reports of fire-arms, with a very short interval between them.

These were all the facts which the police were able to discover in respect of this strange occurrence. It was at first reported that a double murder had been committed; but this was soon seen to be unfounded. The only question that remained was, whether those two persons had each committed suicide, or whether one had been killed by the other, with or without his own consent-the survivor afterwards dying by his own hand. The letter above given seems conclusive that the tragedy had been pre-arranged by the victims. The evidence of the surgeon was inconclusive as to the other alternatives. The corpse lying undermost was that of the younger person. There was a perforation, as of a pistol shot, through the vest, a little below the heart; but the circumstances did not indicate whether the shot had been fired by his own hand, or by that of another. had evidently died before his companion destroyed himself, for his face had been carefully covered over by a rug. The wound of the elder person showed plainly that it had been inflicted by his own hand. He had placed the pistol under his chin; the bullet had traversed the head, and come out at the crown, carrying away a wig which the deceased wore.

He

The suicides were traced to be the sons of a Mr. Bittleston, residing in the Hornsey-road. This unfortunate person, an aged man, attended the coroner's inquest, and identified the bodies as those of his sons, Herbert and Charles, one aged 38, the other 23, both clerks in an insurance company. He stated that they left home on