IN A SMUGGLER’S CAVE

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12618, 1 December 1926, Page 4

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, lie 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 beard and a thick moustache. He is only 23, but is tall, strong and 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 spoke with the accent of a public school man. Baker had not established himself in the smugglers’ cave without a great deal of personal peril. The cave lies in a wild part of the coast, frowned at by beetling cliffs, barred by pricklr shrubs and with sea roaring but a few yards away at high tide. It is exceedingly difficult of approach. The only evidence of robberv 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. A BROKEN ROMANCE “What led you to select such a wild place for your residence?” Baker was asked. He 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, he said, they pledged their love and promised to become man and wife. But a few weeks later the girl changed her mind and married another man. Baker turned gloomy and sour. He brooded long; and 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 Fairlight Glen, and illusive fancy led his steps to Hastings. Baker tramped and tramped, supporting himself on the road by doing odd jobs, begging, and, if all failed, by appropriating what was necessary for life. At last, after a fortnight on the road, he reached Fairlight Glen. There he sat down and fancied that he was still hearing the pledge of faith and love repeated. When night came he looked for shelter against wind arfcl 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, and Baker took from these just what was necessary. He then returned to his cave and brooded oyer 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.”