A correspondent, writing from Amélia les Bains, says:—A very singular
blunder was committed the other day by the officials of a railway station
between Prepignan and Toulon. A gentleman who had been spending the
winter here with his family, left last week for Marseilles, taking with
him the body of his mother-in-law, who died six weeks ago, and who had
expressed a wish to be buried in the family vault at Marseilles. When he
reached Marseilles and went with the commissioner of police—whose
presence is required upon these occasions—to receive the body from the
railway officials, he noticed to his great surprise that the coffin was
of a different shape and construction from that which he had brought from
here. It turned out upon further inquiry that a mistake had been
committed by the officials, who had sent on to Toulon the coffin
containing his mother-in-law’s body, believing that it held the remains
of a deceased admiral, which was to be embarked for interment in Algeria,
while the coffin awaiting delivery was the one which should have been
sent on. The gentleman who was placed in this awkward predicament,
having requested the railway officials to communicate at once with Toulon
by telegraph, proceeded thither himself with the coffin of the admiral,
but the intimation had arrived too late. He ascertained when he got
there that the first coffin had been duly received, taken on board, amid
“the thunder of fort and of fleet,” the state vessel which was waiting
for it, and despatched to Algeria. He at once called upon the maritime
prefect of Toulon, and explained the circumstances of the case, but
though a despatch-boat was sent in pursuit, the other vessel was not
overtaken. He is now at Toulon awaiting her return, and I believe that
he declines to give up the coffin containing the deceased admiral until
he regains possession of his mother-in-law’s remains.