IN A SMUGGLER'S CAVE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19496, 27 November 1926, Page 2 (Supplement)

IN A SMUGGLER'S CAVE.

REJECTED LOVER'S DESPAIR.

A YOUNG MAN'S DOWNFALL

TALE OF SHATTERED ROMANCE,

How the shattering of a love romance drove a young public school man to brood in miserable solitude in a smugglers' cave in the Fairlight Glen, at Hastings, England, was told when Frederick Charles Baker was recently charged with a number of petty thefts. Baker, who was said to have broken into cottages in the glen, and to have stolen bread, biscuits, cheese, and other food, and possibly a few coppers, was arrested after a violent struggle. He was declared insane, and ordered to be detained during the King's pleasure. When he was arrested his hair was long and unkempt, and his face was overgrown with a bristling heard and a thick moustache. He is only 23, but is tall, strong md muscular and the detectives found that ordinary handcuffs would not fit him.

The accused walked into the dock with the assured steps of a gentleman, and poke with the accent of a public school man. Baker had not established him| self in the smugglers' cave without a great" 1 deal of personal peril. The cave lies in a wild part of the coast, frowned at by beetling cliffs, barred by prickly shrubs and with sea roaring but a few yards

away at high tide. It is exceedingly difficult of approach. The only evidence of robbery discovered inside the cave was loaves of stale bread, broken meat, pieces of mouldy cake, and what seemed to be the relic of a girl's dress.

" What led you to select such a wild place for your residence?" Baker was asked. Ho then told of a love infatuation. He had spent many hours in the Fairlight Glen with his sweetheart. Friendship matured into romance, which flooded the whole of his being, and on which he banked all his hopes. Last Easter they were together in the glen on the famous Lover's Seat. Here, lie said, they pledged their love and promised to become man and wife. But a few weeks later tha girl changed her mind and married another man.

' Baker turned gloomy and sour. He brooded long; ana then came the climax. " Yes, I am a public school man," said Baker when reference was made to his accent. " I was at ——School, and destined by my father for the Church." His

father was a clergyman in the West of England. After his disappointment he abandoned himself to a wandering fancy. In his reveries he thought of the pleasant hours he had spent at b'airiight Glen, and illusive fancy led his steps to Hastings. Baker tramped and tramped, supporting himself on the toad by doing oud jobs, begging, and, if all failed, by appropriating what was necessary for life. At last, after a fortnight on the road, he reached Fairlight lueii. There he sal down and fancied that he was still hearing the pledge of faith and love repeated. When night came he looked for shelter against wind and rain. A • cave near by offered the necessary hospitality and Baker seized it. When hunger pressed him he prowled about for means to assuage it. There are but few cottages dotted over the glen, (nd Baker took from these just what was tiecmary. He then returned to his cave and hooded over his lost sweetheart, his clergyman father, his friends, his blighted prospects of life, until one morning the police came and " the law took its course."