Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 December 1890 — Murdered by a Statue. [ARTICLE]

Murdered by a Statue.

The death of Kenith, the half-mythi-cal King of Scotland, was one of the most curious and remarkable in history, if it may be called a historical fact It seems that Kenith had slain Cruthlintus, a son, and Malcolm Duflus, the king and brother of Fennella; she, to be revenged, caused Wiltus, the most ingenious artist of the time, to fashion a statue filled with automatic springs and levers. Finished and set up, this brazen image was an admirable work of art. In its right hand Wiltus placed a ewer and in the left an apple of pure gold, finely set with diamonds and other precious stones. To touch this apple was to court death. It was so arranged that any one guilty of such vandalism would be immediately riddled with arrows shot from loop-holes in the statue’s body. Kenith was invited to see the wonder, and, kinglike (just as Fennella hoped), tried to pluck the imitation fruit. He was instantly riddled with poisoned arrows, dying where he fell.