The New Hampshire Gazette

The following mysterious occurrence is said to have taken place in the environs of Paris:—

A person, exercising public functions, having been appointed guardian to a young lady, was unfaithful to his trust, and in order to conceal his delinquency, contemplated an union between his son and his ward. The latter constantly refused, on account of a secret attachment to another young man.—The guardian was the more mortified at the refusal, as the time approached for surrendering his accounts. He came to Paris with his son, leaving in the country his daughter of the same age as his ward; but suddenly returned home, where he arrived very late. A single servant knew of the return of his master. The ward was going to bed, when she heard a noise in the garden under her windows. Upon listening she heard heavy dead blows, which filled her with alarm, and she went to the chamber of her companion, saying that she was come to sleep with her. The latter ridiculed her for cowardice, and in order to prove that there was no danger offered to exchange beds for the night—the offer was accepted—the grave destined for the victim was finished, for it was the digging of this that the ward heard. The assassins entered the chamber where they imagined they should find their prey. They were armed, not with a dagger, but with a mask of softened pitch, which they applied to the face of the sleeping girl, and when assured that she was dead transported her to the garden and buried her. The agitation of father and son was extreme on the following morning, when they saw the ward, whom they supposed to be murdered, come into breakfast. The latter being filled with fear, ran to seek her friend, and not finding her, went out and informed the magistrates, who ordered the murderers to be apprehended. The affair is now in a course of investigation.