The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1908-10-02
THIRTY YEARS IN A CAVE.

Seven miles north of New Cambria,
Mo-, is man who for thirty years
has lived in a dug-out for the sole
purpose of saving house rent, says a
correspondent of the Kansas City
Star.
Something like forty years ago a
young Welshman living in the vicinity
of Cambria became homesick and
spent all the money he owned on
trip back to the old country, Wales.
Returning year or so later he
found himself in need of a suit of
clothes, but without the money to
buy it.. When he tried to borrow of
a friend he met the response some of
the rest of us have known.
He was told that his credit was not
good. 1t was here that the iron en-
tered his soul and he reflected that
little self-denial and saving would
put him where he could loan instead
of borrow money. He got the use of
an acre of ground seven miles from
town and built himself dug-out.
Here he has lived alone ever since,
supporting himself on his garden and
on food bought from the village
housewives with personal service,
such as chopping wood and carrying
In coal.
Jones is the mans name and as
this is Welsh neighborhood, and at
least every third Welshman is named
Jones, this one is distinguished by
adding the name of the locality in
Wales from which he came, and so he
is known as Jones of Bolla
saw him once. He had come to
the boarding house to earn his dinner
by some small service, and he sat be-
side me at the table, clean, pink
skinned old man with a Santa Claus
face and curly white hair and beard.
Kind blue eyes looked out from under
shaggy white brows, and his table
manners were not what you would
expect from man who had lived
thirty years alone.
A money-lender he surely is now
Thirty-five years wages at any ordi-
nary labor put aside or loaned out at
interest have given him hoard of
a number of thousands, which he in
vests and reinvests for the sole pur-
pose of boarding, while he still lives
on in his dug-out, denying himself
such costly luxuries as home, in the
ordinary sense, and wife and child.
Yet Jones cannot be wholly selfish.
They tell how before his voice grew
cracked and old he took days off to
gather the young folks around him
and instruct them in singing, but al
ways in Welsh. Years ago, too, when
fruit was rare and high priced, he has
been known to work for whole day
for a bushel of apples to distribute
among the neighbors' children.
One cold October afternoon
friend drove me out to see the old
man. The place was reached by a
ridge road, curving around the edge
of meadow. AS we approached we
could see across the meadow little
spur of high land jutting into the
meadow land and sloping down to it's
level On three sides. On the southern
side of this spur was Jones dug-out,
shaped from the side of the hill
Away from it on two sides sloped
the land to the hay meadow. On this
slope were his vegetable beds Here
and there he had little mounds under
which he had cached potatoes and
turnips for winter Use.
Near the door grew a few peach
trees and a grapevine 'trailed ire
sponsibly over rude trellis.
No COW, chicken, or other animal
marred the perfect grassy cleanliness
of every portion of the yard
No dog even sounded a warning
bark as we approached. Had Jones
been a woman a cat would have
crouched in the grass On the lookout
for mice, or sprawled asleep near the
door, but Jones will have nothing to
do with CATS
AS we approached down the little
slope the sun came out for the first
time that day and gilded the crisp
edges of the brown oak leaves, drift
ing down from higher up the slope.
We called, and Jones came forth
to welcome us. A woman, l am
afraid, who had not one to "dress up
for" for half lifetime would have
grown slatternly and dirty, but Jones
of Bolla, while not rigged in the
latest style and wearing nothing but
socks upon his feet, was nevertheless
spotlessly clean.
He was glad to see us and showed
us his dugout in detail, unconsciously
betraying the greatest pride in it.
Within, l should say, it was possi-
bly, ten feet long by eight wide, and
from floor to ceiling two sides of the
room were lined with shelves packed
with numberless and nameless things.
A small cookstove and goods box
table rubbed elbows On the third side
and the entrance took the most of
the fourth. A tomato can was the
only cooking utensil in sight
Papers, boxes, tools, bundles of
clothes Or rags, thread, thimble, Ian
tern, hair-trunk, shoes, books, and
bottles fitted the shelves.
The uppermost shelf across the end
was the old mans bed. Scarcely two
feet above it was the ceiling We
could understand how he got into
bed, for a three-foot ladder stood
below, but how on earth he ever
turned over when he got there with
out humping himself against the CELL
ing we couldn't make out