Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1883-01-24

| IN the chamber OF the Jews, but Il
watch the use they made of it. They
employed it to wrap up parcel of one
hundred pistoles. On the morning
after observing this, the Frenchman, a:
soon as he arose, alarmed the house
with cries of "robberyr' Everybody
ran to his chamber, and there heard
him tell a melancholy tale of the loss o
one hundred pistoles, which he had
wrapped up in the front of his gown
He asserted that some one must have
entered while he slept, and cut away
the part of the gown with the money
The. officers of justice were called in tc
examine the house. In the chamber o
the Jews was found the portion o
gown, and the Frenchman then called
out "There is my money !" The Jews
were timorous men, and were thrown
into confusion. This strengthened the
case against them, and the consequence
was, that they were executed. At an
after period, the guilty author of their
death confessed the conspiracy by
which he had implicated them.
THE FLEMISH CURATE.
Another victim of a plot of this ma.
ture was a Flemish curate, who lived
near the commencement of the eigh.
teenth century He was a man of re-
markable piety, and exhibited in his
conversation and department, all the
virtues which ought to adorn the
character of him who assumes to be
the teacher of others In his parish
resided man of violent passions, who
entertained a mortal enmity against
another parishioner and neighbor, and
resolved to assassinaIe him. Casting
his eyes deliberately about him to dis
cover a mode of doing this with safety,
this wretch noticed habit which the
curate had of throwing off his walking
coat whenever he entered his own
house, and of putting on a short cas-
sock in its stead, leaving the coat care
lessly in the outer room or lobby,
which was open to friend or stranger
at almost any time. Observing this
custom, the man alluded to resolved
upon taking a diabolical advantage of
it. He fixed upon time when he
knew the curate to be usually engaged
in composing the sermon for the follow
ing Sundays service, and entered the
lobby, whence be carried off the coat,
and a neckerchief, which be found also
there. He knew that, Immediately
after this time, the person whose as
sassination he meditated would pass by
a retired spot near the village. The
villain had planned his time well. The
victim came up to the spot as expect
ed, and perished under the knife or
dagger of his enemy, who afterwards
returned, without delay, to the curate's
house. Favored by the dusk, he
placed the coat, neckerchief, and dag
ger, in the lobby whence he had taken
them, and then went off to the nearest
magistrate, and denounced the curate
as the murderer, declaring that he him
self, from little distance, had beheld
the commission of the crime. The
magistrate hurried to the reported
scene of the deed, saw and recognized
the body, aud then proceeded to the
house of the unfortunate and uncon-
scious clergyman Half hidden in the
lobby were found the coat, the ker-
chief, and the dagger, all of them more
or less stained with blood The curate
was arrested and thrown into prison.
When the matter sustained judicial
examination the "bold, bad man" who
had projected this double murder. ad-
hered to his story, and as nobody was
with the curate at the time in his dwell
ling, the accused had no eXculpatory
evidence to offer, excepting what was
afforded by his simple protestation of
innocence, and the sanctity of his
former character. All his flock, and
indeed all who knew him. believed him
to be utterly incapable Of such crime;
but the law, and the judges of the law,
regarded tie criminatory testimony as
too strong to be doubted, and held it to
be their duty to condemn the accused.
The best of men, it was argued by the
public prosecutors, have been known to
be hurried by the violence Of temporary
passion into the commission of crime,
and such was but too probably the case
here. When the sentence was known,
a great sensation was excited over the
whole country. The whole community
was in favor of the curate, but this
could not save him from the stake, to
which he was doomed He died with
degree of calm resignation, which
drew tears of admiring pity from all
who saw him.
Four years after his execution, the
villain who had caused his end involv-
ed himself in another murder, and on
this occasion the crime was brought
home to him. He was condemned to
be broken on the Wheel-a death too
horrible for even such a criminal as he
was. Before he died, he confessed the
whole facts of the curate's case. The
memory of the latter was thenceforth
honored like that of the saints.
THE BARRIERS APPRENTICE.
September IA, 1872, came on, at
the sessions at the Old Bailey, the
trial of one Male, barber's apprentice,
for robbing Mrs. Ryan, of Portland
Street, on the highway, on the 18th of
June last. The witnesses swore posi-
lively to the identity of the lad, and
the whole court imagined him guilty.
He said nothing in his defence, but
that he was innocent, and his evidences
would prove it. His evidences were
the books of the court, to which refer
ence being made, it appeared that on
the day and hour when the robbery
was sworn to be committed, the lad
was on his trial at the bar where he
then stood, for another robbery, in
which he was likewise unfortunate
enough to be mistaken for the person
who committed it; on which he was
honorably acquitted"
Don't tell your wife that you love
her well enough to go to the end of the