STRANGE TALE OF FRAUD.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9096, 23 May 1908, Page 3

STRANGE TALE OF FRAUD.

Tho police of Vienna are now busily investifiratiner what is probably one of the most extraordinary < ases of fraud O ) t'doufil. According to tli3 Central No vs Agency tliey have arrested a woman named Margaret Erb, who has jot* years past victimising residents in the humble sactioh of Ihe capital by giving heraolf out to be a prince, forced to adopt female afctira to escape intriguing relatives. The accused woman possesses. a striking personality, and her masculine features and rather deep voice no doubt helped her in {raining credence for her amazing story. A fluent speaker, and of refined babies, she firmly convinced scores that she was indeed the "Prince Bgon" that she pretended to be. and from one tradesman and his relatives she obtained in all £750 for the ostensible purpose of bringing legal proceedings against princely relatives scheming to obtain unlawful possession of an imaginary estate wo-th some millions of marks. Erb had engaged herself to marry a girl, who appears to have been completely duped, and who even now declines to believe that her "lover" is a woman of forty-six, and a former occupant of a lunatic asylum.