The body of a well-dressed young man was found off Manhattan Beach, Sept. 28th. In his pockets a torn photograph of Strindberg and receipts for three registered letters were found. These receipts were traced to Mr. Herts and to friends in Toronto, one of whom identified the body on Oct. 2d as that of Wallace E. Baker. He was buried on Oct. 3d in Evergreen Cemetery, Brooklyn.
A. K.
Note: In cutting out his references to places and people, Baker marred some of the text. These excisions are indicated by dots, dashes or stars.
THE GLEBE is indebted to Mr. Herts and “The International” for the permission to publish the diary.
[THE DIARY OF A SUICIDE]
—, January 26, 1912.
It is with mingled feelings of hope, discouragement, joy and pain that I begin the second book of my diary.
My hope springs from the fact that my outlook seems to be clearer ahead, the old uncertainty is more in the background, but there is another side to it all. My discouragement comes from my constant feeling of tiredness, less evident in the evening and for awhile at night, but exceedingly strong during every afternoon with few exceptions. This has resulted in my weak yielding to weakness at night, and only last night after my confidence that I had gained a certain mastery I was overcome. This was partly from the fact that I worked at the office until nearly ten o’clock, charging a supper with wine to the firm. Although I drink very little, now and again I have gone out and taken a decent meal with wine to get away from the monotonous boarding-house fare. A small bottle which I nearly emptied (cheap wine) resulted in making me feel good—I have never been under the influence of liquor more than to feel good, never without full possession of my faculties, but on the rare occasions when I have taken a little I have sometimes noticed a weakening of the faculties, a sort of lack of moral restraint. I had enough last night to weaken for a time my new found resolutions, but the succeeding absolute disgust and worry lead me to believe that I was not wrong in thinking that the struggle is now on a higher plane.