The Sun.
London, England, 1849-12-27 00:00:00

AN ARTFUL STRATAGEM.

A good deal of excitement was caused in the
neighbourhood of Niagara Falls on the 27th of No-
vember last, by the report that a lady named Mrs.
Miller had thrown herself over Niagara Falls. It
seems that she arrived in the morning train, having
with her two little boys, four and six years old.
After taking rooms at the Eagle Hotel, she called for
writing materials, and nothing more was heard from
her until next morning, when the boys rang the bell
and inquired for their mother. On the table of her
room were found three letters, respectively addressed
to Major Miller, U.S.A., the Hon. J. Norvell, of
Detroit (Michigan), and the landlord of the Eagle
Hotel. A copy of the last epistle is before us. It
announced that the mind of the writer (Mrs. Miller)
was " made up ;" that she found life no longer worthy
of preservation, and therefore intended to commit
suicide—in such a manner to prevent any of the
morbidly curious from "gazing on her mangled re-
mains." The letter also commended the little boys
to the care of their grandparent—the Honourable
Mr. Norvell abovementioned. The children, on being
interrogated, stated that their mother had " bid
them ' Good-bye"' on the preceding evening, when
she put them to bed. During the day her bonnet
was found on the pier of the bridge leading to
Goat Island, and her shawl tied to the railing. It
was supposed, as a matter of course, that the un-
fortunate lady had sought rest from her troubles
in the abyss below. But, alas, for the
romance - writers ! the Republican, of Buffalo,
too soon dispelled the visions of the " lovers
of the marvellous" by a provokingly matter-of fact
paragraph, stating that Mrs. Miller (the supposed
suicide) was still alive, and that she bad preferred the
embraces of rosy Cupid to those of pale Death—
having, in short, eloped with " a friend" from Phila-
delphia. The theatrical arrangement of the letters
and the shawl and bonnet was, of course, a mere rime
to induce the belief that the body of the frail one was
drowned in the falls of Niagara. The circumstances
which thus relieved the public mind are too closely
connected, and too well attested to leave room for a
doubt that Mrs. Miller is alive and well, and for the
present enjoying the society of her paramour, one Mr.
Henry Blakemer, of Philadelphia. The lover is de
scribed—not very poetically, by the way—as a man
five feet eight inches high, the state of whose heard
certified that it could not have scraped acquaintance
with such a thing as a razor for at least three or four
weeks.

NOTICE.—TAE COUNTESS OF BLFSSINGTON'S NOVEL,
" COUNTRY QUARTERS," in 3 vols., with portrait, and
memoir of her Ladyship by her niece, Miss Power, is
published this day by Mr. Shoberl, 20, Great Marl-
borough•street.-2. Also now ready at all the libraries,
" Flies in Amber," by Miss Pardoe, authoress of" The
City of the Sultan," " The Pretty Woman," &c., 3 vols.
—3. " Napier's Southern Africa," 2 ♦ols. small Bvo.,
with portrait of Sir H. Smith, &c. " The fullest,
clearest, and most satisfactory account- of everything
relating to, or connected with, the Capo that we have
yet seen."--IVaval and Military Gazette,