Louisiana capitolian. (Baton Rouge, La.) 1879-1881, 1880-12-07
pBTR1r1ED WHILE ALIVE.


II ..l ---il--i-----11p-----a+. +. 49, ts
PBTRIrIED WHILE ALIVE 81
zone of the most heart-ren(lins cas-
es that ever came under my notice.
said a we'll Known Louisville physl-
clan, twas that of u man whose death
could not affect his relations, because
he had none; but the manner OF his
dying was SO awful that it was a call
upon common humanity for sorrow.
He was u young fellow who at the
breaking out of the war, when ne
was twenty years old, enlisted and
fought well under Confederate ban
ners. In the terrible warfare about
Nashville he was exposed to the rains
and colds, and contracted inflamato-
nv rheumatism, from which he never
recovered, and which caused his res
;enation. He returned to his home n
miserable creature, and was never
afterward able to walk. For fifteen
Hong years he was dying as slowly
| and surely, and with as much torture
as the most refined cruclties OF hu-
| man invention might have produced.
Opiates? OF course opiates were
administered, but what Of the mo-
ments when the influence had waned,
and when, rushing upon him like
wolves of torture, made raveious by
hunger, the pains broke through the
| veil of insensibility and tugsed At
his frame with teeth Of cruelty? The
very immunity which opium gave
added another horror when it was
withdrawn. He was kept under it,
influence us much as possible. In nine
years he had lost every power o
muscular effort, and sat in his chai
a living corpse, only to lp moved tt
his bed, where he became II mumm,
; with the spark of life still glowing
THE time shortly came when he n
longer lay in his bed, but sitting j
. his invalid chair became the enthron
ed embodiment of a soul too misera
|, bic for life, too sacred to be freed b
t other hands. So he sat yearafter yea
b with lis muscles fixed in iron, h
). his eyes looking upon u world /
d dreary as misery could paint it; b
y voice sinking in his throat, only to b
d expelled by hunted nature in wild an
g piteous cries when the pain rack'
It into hopeless cowardice the strol
7. heart that had led his men to Il
,t caverns of lannon's mouths without
6 finch. Fixed and rigid, the pc
is hoy was a sphinx, endowed with Ii
to and deprived of movement. Eve
l. Joint in him become ossifed by t
o. chalky deposits, not even a NOV
T. ment that provoked deathless ago.
s, became possible. Even the joints
le his neck became rigid, the finge
l. stiff, and the limbs petrified. He "
ly q stone frame with a covering Of file
ed and the soul of living man. I
ut muscles Of the eye even failed, a.
I'd the lids falling upon the weary ba
d, shut in forever the darkness that "
re about him like the gloom of
be grave. Then came with the sa
n step of measured eternity the oss
er cation of the joints of the jaw, q
Il .s =
lie he was fed between the rigid tee
Of How slowly death moved cannot
described, but when the inflamn
nut ton had seized the heart in that !
as prolonged spasm, nature could
nd longer give warning of it's agen
ew What fortunes took place under
ice curtain of that human mystery can
nix more be told than the secrets OF til
q horrors in the lowest dungeons of
'at. inquisition. Death came, but it
ed like the fading of the mist-llnc j
to- the clouds, and rs we stood about
er- chair no one uttered his though
ian none could tell whether the soul s
yed lurked in the prison or whe'
itch death was life OF life was de-
ill. When he was buried his fixed Iii
md were broken with hammers, in Of
ung tllat he might be placed in q cotli'
her
ich A Galveston man furnishes
aid following certificate Of a really va