Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1888-06-15
What conscience Does,

Charles Dickens in Martin ChuzzIS
wits and Erckmann ,atrain in ''The
Polish Jew" have depicted the case o.
criminals who preferred surrenderine
themselves to justice rather than TO
longer endure the feeling that they
were being hunted down like wild
beasts; but such a case OF conscience
has actually happened in Paris. This
same feeling has just driven a muir
derer to give himself up to the police
after they had hunted for him in vain
everywhere. A poor devil named
Cornu killed a dealer IN birds at the
little town named Saint, Maur, and
then he wandered over the face of the
earth IN company of a man whose &C
quaintance he had picked up on the
road. The two made no long haitS
at wayside inns, they avoided towns
and villages, slept under hedges or IN
such sheltered corners as they could
ind, and they made long detCurs to
dodge the gendarmes. In this way
they crossed four departments; Occa-
sionally they were noticed and were
chased by cards champetres, who per
haps knew instinctively that they
were suspicious characters on whom
II might be we'll to lay their hands,
and, although they managed to es-
cape arrest, they had the fear of it
constantly upon them, and the spec
ter Of the guillOtine was ever before
their eyes. Perhaps, too, remOrse,
or at least regret for a useless crime,
hung heavily on COrnu, numbering his
sleep just as it did that Of the success
full Macbeth. Finally, the two tramDs
arrived safely at the frontier and step
ped across 1t into Belgium. They
were now, comparatively speaking,
safe from pursuit, and COrnu's COM
paniOu. who, doubtless, also had his
reasons for stunning the gendarmess
had pagers to prove his identity Whe1
on reaching Antwerp, they applied for
passage as smigrants to the Congo.
He was accepted, but as Cornu had
nothing to show who he was or where
he came from he was refused, the
agent of the free State Of Congo being
determined to keep the Wilds OF Africa
uncOntaminatedb by the presence OF
European criminals.
1t was not In the heart of the dark
continent" that the rePentant, or at
least regretful, murderer could be pei
mitted to begin a new life. Before
separating the two made a division or
the few francs that remained IN the
Joint purse, and then COrnu mechanic
ally Commenced retracing his steps
toward his Own country. He IecEoss-
ed the frontier, followed the same
roads, slept under the same hedges
and lodged the same gsndarmesi final
~, fOOtsOr6 and starving, he reached
the capital, went straight to the
Palais de Justice, and said to q pO-
liceman: F'Arrest me; / am COEnu, the
murderer Of the bird dealer Of Saint
Maur.' Now, it was misery as much
as anything else that put CoEnu in the
I hands Of justice, and one OF the ways
In which remOrse sometimes acts on q.
guilty man is that it makes him feel
himself isolated from the rest Of man
/ kind. There are murderers who are
/ haunted by avenging furiss quite as
/ terrible as those which women, crown
/ ed with Writhing serpents and waving
/ lurld torches. represented on the an
/ cisnb stage, and such men can only
{ find refuge from this mental anguish
+ in a prison esil.-TcFonto AalI.