The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1874-02-12
turned 10 stone-X soIidiacd bride.


DR.. Jorsck, of MarksYille, La, in a letter
to the New York Sun of Saturday says;
Mr.. Frederick Halter is by profession
lawyer. He early acquired, however, quite
fondness for the natural sciences, espe-
cially geology. He has, perhaps, the largest
and most complete geological cabinet in
Louisiana. Something over a month ago he
married, taking as his bride charming
young girl of sixteen. As physician to her
fathers family and an intimate friend I was
an honored guest at the marriage ceremony.
am sure never saw a more beautiful and
happy bride
Next afternoon she and some three or four
of her most intimate friends went into BIr.
Haller's Crock Study" to look over the
cabinet of curiosities. Among the curiosi-
ties which MIR. Hallers had gathered were
several round boulders brought from Ar
kansas. These boulders, on being broken,
present In the central space a crystalline
formation, and are usually not much larger
than the double fists. One of these, how
ever, was unusually large, measuring twenty
one inches in circumference. Frequently
the internal surface, always hollow, contains
water, or rather q concentrated solution of
silica IN water. This fact was known to one
of the young ladies, who mentioned it.
AT once it was proposed to break the
large one, and several Intellectual attempts
were made by them with geological ham
mer. They called to their aid a colored man,
a servant on the place, who was requested
to break open the rock. A pitcher being
placed underneath the boulder as the man
held it, one sturdy blow of his stalwart arm
cracked it, and the fluid within ran out and
was collected in the pitcher, scarcely losing
a drop, there being half pint of it.
The bride, without ever giving it thought,
conceived the notion of drinking the water
from the boulder. She poured most of it
into glass tumbler, nearly filling it, and,
lifting it to her lips, she drank first to the
health Of her husband, then to that of the
unmarried friends in the room, wishes them
shortly to be happy brides like herself, and
drained the glass. But in few minutes
the youthful bride complained of excessive
pain in the stomach, and began to realize
the rashness of her action.
A messenger was sent In haste for her
husband and myself. Mr.. Haller's office
being near my own, we received the mes
sage almost simultaneously, and we rapidly
drove together in my buggy to his house.
When we arrived she was dead, period of
fifteen minutes having elapsed from the time
extinction of life They were just laying her
out on my arrival. To my surprise I found
she had grown in that short period so rigid
as to render it difficult to straighten her
limbs. In the course of three-quarters of an
hour her entire body became as hard an in
flexible as bone.
On more minute examination and inquiry
1 found that the dissolved silica she had
taken into her stomach had been absorbed
and transmitted by the chylopoietic appar-
atus and blood vessels throughout the sys-
tenn, and that her whole body was petri-
faction. The case being so singular, and
so sudden, the husband and the brides
family consented to a partial pOst-mortem
examination, other medical men coming to
my assistance.
We found it impossible to cut through
any portion with our scalpels. DR.. Furgu-
SON broke his scalpel in the first attempt.
We were able only to break through the
chest with a Ratchet, finding extreme diff
Guilty in entering the thoracic cavity, the
contents being all solidifed. The heart
was found as firm and as solid as stone, re-
sembling piece of cornelian as to both
color and consistency.