BRAVE ACT Of "BESSIE" SMITH
HALTS CURFEW FROM RINGING
AND MELTS CROMWELL'S HEART

(By Cable to The Courier)

HUDDERSFIELD, KENT, ENGLAND.—Jan. 15.—Swinging far out above the city, "Bessie" Smith, the young and beautiful fiancÉe of Basil Underwood, a prisoner incarcerated in the town jail, saved his life to-night.

The woman went to "Jack" Hemingway, sexton of the First M. E. Church, and asked him to refrain from ringing the curfew bell last night, as Underwood's execution had been set for the hour when the bell was to ring. Hemingway refused, alleging it to be his duty to ring the bell.

With a quick step Miss Smith bounded forward, sprang within the old church door, left the old man threading slowly paths which previously he had trodden, and mounted up to the tower. Climbing the dusty ladder in the dark, she is said to have whispered:

"Curfew is not to ring this evening."

Seizing the heavy tongue of the bell, as it was about to move, she swung far out suspended in mid-air, oscillating, thus preventing the bell from ringing. Hemingway's deafness prevented him from hearing the bell ring, but as he had been deaf for 20 years, he attributed no importance to the silence.

As Miss Smith descended, she met Oliver Cromwell, the well-known lord protector, who had condemned Underwood to death. Hearing her story and noting her hands, bruised and torn, he said in part: "Go, your lover lives. Curfew shall not ring this evening."

("The Ballad of the Tempest")