Crawford avalanche. (Grayling, Mich.) 1879-19??, 1895-10-10

gpeaoh owladless v1be Fouad Many
puses Amens Trasssmss.
Itisa we'll established fact that
many people who would not be
swindled by any other confidence
game will allow themselves to be be-
guiled OF their savings by tale Of
buried treasure. The latest example
OF this came to the attention of one
OF the criminal courts of Paris the
other day. The accused swindlers
were Pedro Baquet. olive Of skin and
black of hair, and Edouard Antoine.
who was pale and red-headed.
Their modus operandi was beauti-
full In its simplicity and results.
They would carefully select some
Paris tradesman and send him from
some town In Spain cleverely
worded letter about q mysterious
box containing 860. 900 francs buried
for political reasons in the environs
of Paris. The swindler, usually .
prisoner Of State in Spain, professed
to know the tradesman slightly, and
pretended that his daughter. then in
a school in Spain, must be present at
the discovery Of the box. He would
then invite the tradesman to pay the
expenses to Paris of the daughter
and q servant. The daughter would
bring with her the plans and explain
ations necessary to recover the treas
ure. For his reward the tradesman
would be promised third of the
treasure.
The tradesman in most cases would
reply that he did not know the writer,
which brought forth q second letter,
saying that the Spanish prisoner Of
State" lived for some time in the
same street with him at Paris and
was a regular customer. He would
further explain that he had been
commissioned to invest the money
in munitions of war in France, and,
hearing of his intended arrest, had
hidden the treasure. The second
letter would say: Take the Bastille-
Clarendon tramway and get of q
little before you reach Clarendon.
Follow the right hand sidewalk and
you will see six benches. 1t is be-
tween the fifth and sixth benches
that the money is hidden. There
are trees and stones by which can
indicate more exactly the spot.
Twelve hundred francs is the sum
which will be necessary to take my
daughter from her pension -
II the 1000 francs was sent the
dupe would receive o third letter,
demanding 1900 or 8, 600 francs moro
under various pretexts, a favorite
one being an additional bill of the
directress of the boarding school,
written on finely Autographed let
ter head and signed LA Directrice
Dolores de las Naves." The game
would keep on until the victims
funds were exhausted.
The swindlers were caught because
they had chosen Perpignan as the
postoffie when Barcelona grew too
warm for them. There were half
score of witnesses against the swim
dlers, who had lost all the way from
700 to 6, 400 francs. One of them, q
Nine. Bouglet, after having sent all
her money, received letter saying
that the tale of buried treasure was
an invention, and that she had better
say nothing il she did not wish to be
laughed at Others had spent hours
waiting for trains which should bring
them the orphaned Henriette. who
would wear black dress and carry
white handkerchief.
The swindlers were fined 5000
francs and sentenced to five years in
prison, and the judgment was or
dered printed il ten Partisan and
twenty provincial journals, the Judge
adding that he hoped there would be
fewer fools in consequence.