PLAYING FOR A LIFE.

Inangahua Times, Volume VII, Issue 1089, 19 May 1882, Page 2

PLAYING FOR A LIFE.

Not long ago two young fellows, journeymen bronzemiths, were sitting in a small Warsaw cafe, playing dominoes. A glass half full of liquor stood on the table between them, and one or two of their fellow workmen were looking on at the game with evident interest There was little in the appearance of the group to attract especial attention — still less to suggest the improbable notion that the four youths composing it were two duellists and their seconds, or that the stake of the domino match was a human life. Presently, however, the game having come to a conclusion, the

younger of the two players, a lad of sixteen named Stanislas Julian, lifted the glass to his lips and drank off its contents at a draught Five minutes later he was a corpse. The wretched boys had quarrelled, and agreed to fight a duel in such sort that the death of one or the other must ensue. Having placed themselves in the hands of two seconds, these latter arranged that their principals should play a "set" of three games at dominoes, upon the solemn understanding that the loser should swallow a dose of the deadliest poison procurable. This hideous compact was carried out to the end, nor did any of the surviving persons concerned in it, when interrogated by the police authorities before whom were subsequently broqght> betray the least remorse for their shares in the ghastly transaction. Julian's adversary, indeed, boldly avowed that, had he lost the match, he would have fulfilled his pledge to drink the poison as faithfully as had his dead antagonist ; and the seconds protested that they bad "only done their duty in seeing the duel fairly fought oot according to the conditions settled beforehand. n — Daily/ Telegraph."