Connecticut western news., 1882-01-25
A VIVID, PICTURE.
What Southern Correspondent has
 to Say about Guiteau.
From the Atlanta Constitution


 From the Atlanta Constitution.J
 was struck as sat listening at the trial-the lumbering, heavy lawyers, the tedious witnesses, the sharp inter- ruptions of the prisoner, the light cheeriness of the audience, and the dark tragedy that was behind it all-with the uniqueness of this trial among all trials of this sort. What an enormous distance this shaved-skull clown has led us all from the gloom and sorrow of few weeks, ago; how far he had car ried that audience from the broken hearted mother and sorrowing widow at Mentor how jauntily he jingles his fools cap and bells over a grave on which the funeral flowers have hardly lost their bloom. What difference in the scene it presented and the trial of the Nihilist ass sassins 1! What sort of 8 trial would this have been with John Wilkes Booth in the prisoners dock What tremendous and profound interest would there have been in probing the depths of his tragic nature, in bringing to light the secret springs of his life, and la ying bare the secret passions of his soul The world would have waited breathless as the great lawy CTS confronted the great actor, and sought to wiring from him the names of his ac- complices, or put before him as 8 wit ness the one woman he ever loved. How meagre, and fippant, and trifing all this trial compared to what the su- perb and stormy scenes of the other would have been How wretchedly scant of all that is serious or thrilling With what slight accessories is the trial made up! A few faded landladies, whose bread and meat the poor devil had eaten without pay; wife from whom he was divorced simply because he didn't care to support her; half dozen cranks with whom he once asso- ciated in crank communities two or three book agents to prove that, when a book agent himself, he collected money without delivering goods; a wo- man or two to prove that he had on oc- casions been immoral; life plastered> over with misdemeanors, and yet not steadied with one serious thought or weighted with even one respectable crime. It is the incongruity between the man and the deed, the dispropor- tion between this and other assassins, the fippancy of the proceedings of this trial as compared to others, that have taken the people off their feet and bred an infectious lightness in the court room atmosphere that may extend to the jury.
 Strange as it may seem, felt pity for the poor devil of prisoner as I watched him in his dock. An expert has predicted that Guiteau will break down into 8 gibbering idiot before the end of the trial, sane as he was when it started. It is curious and pitiful spec tacle. The tremendous strain upon this small creature, as he turns, bafied in his purpose, deserted by those he counted his protectors, and confronts his as. sailants alone. Cornered, set upon, in- volved in meshes that boar could not break through, he dashes against them with the frenzied impotence of trapped rat. I never saw such mass of flip pant carelessness put over such terror stricken face. The indescribable, hunted look that is under the surface of every feature, the vague appeal for protection or sympathy that fickers in his eyes, the uneasy, ceaseless tremor of the hands, and the scared turns of the head all these tell of the torment he suffers. His cuckoo-like speeches, that were juicy and springy when they came as first inspiration, are now dry and inhu- man, since they have failed to deceive, and only cause laugh where they once started inquiry. There is weariness and distrust in his manner now, since those terrible experts have demonstrated in cold logic that it is impossible for him to be insane. The wrestler with the deceived landladies, the deserted wife, and the buyers of books never delivered, he stood very we'll but these technical experts. that stand not as the accusers of his past life, but the inter- preters of his crime, have been too much for him.
 That he should be hung there is no doubt. That he will be hung there is scarcely less. But could not help pity1ng him as witnessed his unequal and hopeless struggle. And back of this what a hard, unloved life was his, with it's shabby makeshifts-withi it's hungry nights and days of disappoint- ments-its mortifying beggary, it's looming ambitions and it's wretched performance-its misery, it's worthless ness, it's vagueness, it's abjectness, it's homelessness, it's friendlessness, it's misproportions. How many weak and vicious fellows, as he is, with misdi- rected aims and mistaken purposes, with maladjustments and misestimates, are drifting on the swirling current of life-as worthless as he, but less known, simply because they haven't yet been thrown on the rocks. An out cast from all sympathy, devoured by a consuming vanity as deadly as the de- lirium of drink, miserable slink; despised, avoided, lodged, mistrusted, and kicked out. The jailer says that there seems to be only one human being that feels the slightest interest in his future, and that is his sister. Be- yond this one love, he is the utter out cast from human sympathy he has alwaxs heen Ha lnnks into tha crowd