Omaha daily bee., 1889-10-07
A SLAVE TO MORPHINE.
The Details OF the horrible Death of
Brrnhardts Husband.

Brrnhardcs Husband.
A story comes from Paris giving some
sensational details OF the death OF
Jacques Damala, husband of Sarah
Bernhardt. Damala was n slave to the
morphine habit, and during his last sea.
son with Sarah in Egypt won't so far as
TO forge the names of doctors from
Cairo and Alexandria to prescriptions
made by himself ordering enormous
quantities of the soothing poison, says
the Pail Mall Gazette. Walters wera
bribed by him in every hotel where he
lived and became his accomplices In
the slow but sure work of his own de-
struction.
On thcir return from Egypt Sarah
ana her troupe stopped ut Milan. There
Damala could no longer hide his situa-
tion from his friends. Ono evening
when seated with his wife at table
d'hote he was seized for the first time
with fit OF delirium tremens in tho
presence of more than one hundred ter
ritied people Around him he saw
nothing but rats, who were, ho howlod,
assailing him, running over his body
and trying to eat up his vitals.
His formerly fine features were then
horrible to behold. Suddenly he imag.
ined seeing also rats on some of his
companions of travel. rushed upon them
and tore up the dress of several guests
in the dining room. No ono dared TO
lay hands on him; but Sarah, although
frightened to death, seized him i'll her
arms, and by dint of caresscs aud kind
words, brought him back ut last TO his
senses.
From that eventful day Sarah had him
carefully watched, and rs soon as he was
back with her to Paris she summoned
three of the most famous doctors and
asked them to prepare mixture eX-
actly similar to morphine, but thor
oughly inocuous, and induced Damala to
use it. AT first he had been very sus-
picious and had made Il careful analysis
of the new potion, as would have done u
thief who would have stolen counterfeit
coin. But he had discovered nothing,
and was thus saved from himself for Il
little while. Sarah, ali absorbed by tho
rehearsals Of LENA" Mt the Varieties,
had summarly locked him up in her
own house on the Boulevard Percire,
denying him all kinds of flashes, po-
tions, packages and even his street gar
meuts, from fear he would escape and
buy the real article at some druggists
place.
One day. however, he recovered his
liberty, bought big doses of morphine,
and had soon fits of furious madness
He was haunted by the idea that every
one around him was prosecuting him.
He imagined seeing one of his friends
spying him from the rails of the Sub
urban railroad, which was running
under his windows. He thought he
saw Jeanne, the sister of Sarah, coming
down, with the help of Il sheet, from tho
story above, to peer at him, through
his window while he was injecting NOR
phiue under his skin. He heard an
army of spies shouting to him: "Mor-
phine! MorphineI' from under every
board OF the floor in his room. And,
armed with loaded pistol, he would
search the whole house, shouting and
bowling.
"See here the miserable wretches!
They don't fall! The train won't crush
them! They are bullet-proof! All, les
Canaillesl"
When he was dead, at the end Of one
of those frightful scenes, there was not
to be found on his dilapidated body Il
single place which had not been stung
with one of the twenty-three Pravaz
syringes he had used for years to
saturate himself with morphine and
cocaine.