The Sun.
London, England, 1861-10-31 00:00:00

A F.REN CD SWINDLER.

A most extraordinary case was three days back presented'
to the Tribunal of Correctional Police of Laval. A young
man, of the name of Gisquel, for whom the Bishop of
Poitiers pronounced in one of the churches of that city on
the 30th Oct., 1860, a magnificent funeral oration, in the
belief that he had been killed in the Papal ranks at the
battle of Castellldardo,was tried for numerous acts of swind-
ling. He is only 21 years of age, is ill-looking, and of
coarse manners. An account to this effect was given of
him :—He was born at Guingamp, of extremely poor pa-
rents, and"was taught the trade of a carpenter. But he was
of idle and dissolute habits, and some time back left his na-
tive town. He obtained work at Montfort, department of
the Sarthe, but in a fortnight was discharged. Whilst
there he called on the parish priest, and pretending to be a
Protestant converted to Catholicism, prayed to be baptised ;
but, for some reason, his request was not complied with.
He next went to a place called Saint-Marc-la-Briere, In the
same department, and before long, on a similar pretext,
was baptised there. But a person from whom he had
obtained work was not satisfied with him, and he left.
He next went to Savigne, in the Indre-et-Loire, and
there introduced himself to the parish priest as a Protes-
tant disquieted in conscience. The priest gave him in-
struction, and was so pleased with his apparent piety that
he presented him to the Archbishop of Tours. Gisquel de-
manded baptism, and a lady and gentleman undertook to be
his sponsors ; but before administering the sacrament the
Cur 6 of Savigne wrote to Guingamp, and he learned that
when a child he had been duly baptised in that place. As
he had obtained various sums of money from the curs and
other persons, he was given into custody as a swindle'r, but
no prosecution was instituted, and ho was released. There
is some reason to believe that before he was arrested he had
imposed on a priest at some other place in the neighbour-
hood of Tours, and had obtained baptism from him. Ho
next turned up at Poitiers, and there he enlisted in the
Papal Zouaves. Until he could be sent to Italy board and
lodging were provided for him at the expense of the bishop,
of a gentleman named de Coursac, and others, and they
also gave him money. After a while he went to Italy
and in October, 1860, his protectors at Poitiers re•
ceived a letter in which ha announced that he
had been mortally wounded with grape-shot, at
Castelfidardo, but that he was glad to die for religion,
and left " the course for which he had fought in the hands
of the Lord I" On the envelope were the words, apparently
in another handwriting, " Dead I dead I" From this letter,
joined to the fact of a similar one with the same ominous
words on the outside, having been received at Guingamp,
no doubt was entertained that the man had fallen in the
Pope's cause. At Guingamp some zealous persons wished
to have a funeral service celebrated for him, but the clergy
of that place declined to perform ono until they should ob-
tain positive proof of the death. At Poitiers, however, a
service for the repose of his soul was celebrated with pecu-
liar solemnity in the church of Sainte-Radegonde, and as
stated above, the bishop afterwards delivered a funeral ser-
mon on him. Nothing could be more pompous than the
terms in which the prelate spoke of him; among other
thingsch rChristian,
hean a
said
ch anld
:r— iisnagrirnueestColelmristthianesa,
caracomnesnctieonftious
bap-
tism, a Christian who knew his own dignity, and considered
i‘ He
ho wa
himself as the child of God, as the brother of Jesus Christ, as
a citizen and member of the Holy Church on earth, as heir
of the kingdom of heaven I" Some months back, the au-
thorities of Laval learned that a man was levying con-
tributions from pious persons in that town on the allegation
that he had been aide-de-Camp of Gen. de Lamoriciere, and
had been wounded at Castelfidardo. As this statement was
ascertained to be untrue, he was arrested, and then the
startling discovery was made that he was Gisquel, who had
been treated as dead at Poitiers ! From inquiries, which
were afterwards instituted, it was ascertained that though
he had joined the Papal army in Italy, he had so grossly
misconducted himself, that he had been ordered for trial
before a court martial, but that his chiefs had preferred to
turn him out of the army altogether to trying him. He was
only for a very short time in the service, and never took
part in any engagement whatever. From Italy he came to
France, and at Paris, Le Mars, Nogent-le-Rotrou, Chartres,
Orleans, Tours, Rennes, and lastly Laval, he levied contri-
butions on the pretext that he was a " martyr of Castelfi-
dardo." Finally, it was ascertained that at all these places,
and even at Poitiers before his departure, he used to spend
in drunkenness and debauchery the money given
was
The The man, who defended himself with great impudence,
condemned to 15 months' imprisonment, 50f. fine,
years' surveillance of the police. On hearing theyond
anemdfinvae.
tion he laughed sarcastically.

WARMING RAILWAY CARRIAGES.—The Lon-
don and North-Western Railway Company, with the view
of availing themselves of the system of warming carriages
from the exhausted steam of the engines introduced with
success in Franco last winter, had a trial of the invention
(by way of experiment) at Wolverton station yesterday,
I with the most favourable results. This mode of using the
waste steam involves only a trifling expanse, and now that
the winter and cold nights are settingin the adoption of
the system will be a great boon to the
public, every car-
riage being made comfortable without e4,ception of ciao.