The herald., 1896-09-18

consideration the note was given the
plaintiff seemed to display considerable
hardihood in seeking to recover under
such peculiar circumstances. :.
It appeared that the male Popperwell
worked for Mr.. Joyce, who is the well
known brickmaker, and had his home
in the brickyard. Popperwell went to
Azusa,, and, according to the plaintiff
statement, while she was milking the
COW in the afternoon Joyce came along
and learned from her that her husband
had gone out Of town. She claims that
he then made an indecent proposition,
but anyway that night he came to the
little home and carried her from one
room into the other, and would have
pursued hfs assault still further but for
the rigidity of her virtue. She repealed
his advances, but did condescend to
pour him out q drink of whisky from a
flask which he brought with him, and
permitted him to sleep on the lounge in
the parlor while she sat up and kept
weary vigil in the kitchen. In the
morning she gave Joyce his breakfast
and he left.
enough with all the frills of exuberant
verbiage with which 1t was trimmed,
but 1t served as mere introduction to
the main point in the case
Some time afterwards Joyce. 1t is al
legged, took Mrs. Popperwell's little step
Notwithstanding of the husband by
q first wife-into his house and there
deliberately debauched her. The child's
age did not appear in the testimony,
but as she is childish in appearance and
her ruin was wrought in December,
1894, she must at that time have been
under the statutory age of consent The
child. so the story runs. told her
mother what had happened. and she In
turn told her husband, with the result
that Joyce was asked to the house and
a family conclave was held. The tes-
timony Of husband and wife varies
somewhat as to what actually did take
place. Mrs. Popperwell says that as
the full facts of the outrage were told
her husband became SO enraged that he
shouted, You ought to be shot," and
jumped from his seat toward the place
where a gun hung suspended on the
wall. Joyce made for the door, but Mrs.
Popperwell drew the line of vengeance
at firearms. and SO hostilities were
suspended. Joyce then combatted the
idea of Mrs. Poperwell that the house,
hold must be broken up. She MAIN
tanned that she couldn't remain in the
city where the child would meet by
any chance her seducer. He consented
to pay all the expenses of sending her
to a boarding school, but the father said
he'd be hanged II he'd send his child
away from home for such as him, SO
that scheme fell through.
With the ingenuity of the female mind,
Mrs. Popperwell found a way out of the
difficulty. Joyce said he'd do anything
the father and mother wanted so that
he should not be disgraced. In such
emergency Mrs. Popperwell said she
thought $1,000 would about fill the bill,
and asked him how that proposition
struck him. Being caught in the door,
Joyce could not squeal, supposing the
facts to be as stated, and he agreed to
pay over $1,000 in good United States coin
gold, too. On the following Wednes-
day he paid 5000 and gave his note for
$500. The note has never been paid,
and Mrs. Popperwell was aggrieved and
sought legal redress.
1t probably never occurred to the
good lady that in making such an
agreement with her stepdaughter's raw
Usher she was actually compromising a
felony II the girl was under age. On the
other hand, she acted in very question
able taste in accepting a price for the
dishonor of the girl, assuming that she
child had turned the 14-year point.
OF course the defendant denied the
story in toto, and Judge VanDyke fl
nally lost patience and in ordering a
dismissal ofthe case each side to pay
their own costs, said that the only way
to settle such cases was to throw them
outside and let them be settled there.