Litchfield enquirer., 1878-07-25

Here Chase was visibly moved He shrank as it were, within himself; he dropped his eyes, covering. Presently he said, recovering slightly:
 '1 had hoped to have been spared this, see- ing that my words were intended for no eyes but my mothers"
 ''The whole business" went on the Chair man, ''ls so visionary and unsatisfactory that you are bound to explain to whom you refer; your position with us demands it. You have been tried and trustworthy servant, but you will forfeit all the past if you do not aid us in our efforts to discover the perpetrator of this robbery. An indication of whom this myste- rious person IS may give us clue. I conjure you to tell us everything, Mir. Chase"
 Again he resisted again he was urged to speak; he continued silent, growing paler every moment. There was nervous clutch ing of the hands, and twitching of the mouth he staggered as if he were going to faint he sank upon chair, and his head dropped; it was very painful scene now, orhe was much respected. Once again the Chairman insisted, commanding him to say to whom he alluded?
 At length he arose looking more like ghost than anybody ever saw, and gazing vacantly round the room with return of his old drea- my air, said in a faint and hollow voice, and without seeming to address anyone in particu- lar: tIt matters little now. The shadow falls upon me for the last time; it can never lift again. He casts it upon me; he has blight ed my life; he hastens my death."
 ''Who? Whom do you mean ?" cried the Chairman. For one minute Chase seemed brought back to waking state He looked straight at the Chairman as he replied ''My brother. Sir my twin brother. I will con ceal nothing from you now. When only sixteen years of age he was transported for forgery We contrived to hide the business from our friends had we not done so I should never have obtained the post of trust l have held in your bank. Had the fact of his exis- tence even reached your cars while yet held it, you would have taken it from me, and I and my mother would have been irretrievably dsgraced. This is why did not write his name in that statement. But his name was Edward, and you will find the record in-". The speaker suddenly stopped, put his hand to his forehead, once more staggered back into the chair, and thence fell heavily to the floor
 The doctor, who had watched his case throughout, was by his side instantly, and af- ter the very slightest examanation, pronounced him dead
 There is no occasion to dwell upon what i'm mediately followed. His dying statement was found to be correct, and an Edward Chase twin brother to John-proved to have been transported two years before the latter obtained his bank appointment
 Our Directors made it their business, through the Home Office, to get every infor- nation concerning this man, and the whole of this strange business is made the stranger by what they thus discovered. It turned out after the most careful scrutiny and comparison of dates, that the convict Edward Chase had not only never left the Australian penal colo ny to which he had been consigned, and, therefore, could never have had a hand in the robbery on the Whteways, but that, after committing series of crimes as bushranger, he was convicted of having robbed and killed a man on lonely highway on the 18th of No- vember, 1846; that he escaped, and, being recaptured at the end of some months, was actually executed on the very day that poor John fell down dead in our board-room!
 These are the facts, and, suppose, justify the name which, in this neighborhood, is given to.the story. It has been terrible shadow indeed. It rested on the whole of us for a long time, can tell you; but, for my part, think it all came from poor Johns encourag- ing his dreamy fancies for wandering about the downs and lonely places and reading poetry, Shakespeare, and the like. I don't hold with that sort of thing; it partly turned his head poor fellow, Pm sure-at least, you will understand that's the way in which I &C., count for it all, for you'll never convince me that there was anything more than coincidence in it. The poor fellows queer, odd nature was so worked upon that he probably had fit when he got to the Whiteways and fell out of the gig. The doctor told me privately that was his opinion. and it was a fit that killed him in the end. 1 am not going to believe, as some folks do hereabouts there was any spir- itual influence at work in his dreaming. Why, l know man who wants to make out that it was the villainous life the brother in Australia was leading, and his contemplating of the murder which he committed on the 18th of November that affected the mind of John Chase, here in England-through their twin ship, you understand. Bah Pm not going to believe that kind of stuff-no, Pm too mat ter-of-fact for that, hope. Ton shake your heads, but the end proves Pm right, think.
 Eight years and half passed and the mat ter was almost forgotten, when, one Spring, the little mere, which lies between Gray's Farm and the town of Meresdene was drained and, among the white chalky mud, what did the workmen come upon but an old brown leather bag, with paddock! My old leather bag, with all the money that poor John Chase had with him when he left the bank that night every penny of it intact, except for the rotting which the notes and checks had got from the wet .l
 We'll, for a day or two this was the greatest wonder of all. However could it have got there? The neighborhood all round was talk ing about it, and, as matter of course it | comes to the ears of certain man, lying sick, well-nigh to death, of fever at Grays Farm. | When he hears of this find he turns very un- comfortable, sends for the parson, and says he: q can't die with it on my soul-I flung that bag into the mere, 1 did"
 "How did you come by it?"
 'Why, when Joe Muzzle and came upon the body of that poor young Chase, lying up- on the Whiteways, ,and were groping about with the lanterns, and picking up the whip, and the cushions and the pistols, and all the | rest of it, I kicked against the pag. Joe never saw me. I guessed what it contained I l slipped it into my pocket, and said nothing | about it. When got home found I could | n't open it, and hid it for two or three days | under my bed. Then, when I got wind that the Police were likely to search Joe's crib and mine, why, I grew frightened lest it should be found on me, 1 slipped out in the middle of the night, and flung it into the mere."
 With this confession on his lips the man died and the man was Farmer Gray's fore man !-AH the YeGr R0u0d
 The Canaan Camp Meeting Association,
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