Idaho County free press. [volume] (Grangeville, Idaho Territory) 1886-current, 1890-06-27
THE ELEPHANT MAN"
Hounded and Stunned Bacrss Of His
Horrible Dsformity.
At Last charitably Provided For, and Given
the Attention Of Royalty.-A Heart as Ten
deras that Of a Child--Pined for sympa-

We can remember no invented tale,
says the London Speaker, that speaks
so to the heart at once of the cruelty
of life and the beauty OF human COM
passion as the true story closed this
week by sentence in the newspapers
announcing that Joseph Merrick. the
elephant Man." was dead. Imagine
a human soul clothed 10 body so UNI
speakably frightful that seeing it. men
turned sick with loathing, and women
tainted; a being who had to he con-
veyed from place to place in secret;
who hardly dared to venture abroad
even by night; who, finding his fellow
creatures ran from him, grew terrified
by the terror he created and shud-
,dered in dark corners like a hunted
beast. Imagine him driven by starva-
tion to accept showman's offer and
be exhibited to the most brutal OF au-
,diences that commonly enough
shrieked and ran pell- NELL from the
tent as soon as the curtain was drawn.
Early in 1886 Mr.. Frederick Treves.
one of the surgeons of the London
hospital, found Mel rick in q penny
show, in a room off the Whitechapel
road. crouching behind an old curtain
and trying to warm himself over a
brick that was heated by a gas jet.
Mr.. Treves went up to him not only
without fear or loathing. but with SYM
.pathy. For the first time in his life OF
"a years Merrick heard kind word
and was spoken to like q man. The
effect was curious. 1t made him afraid
at first. He shrank as an ordinary
man would from something uncanny.
Then as he began to realize the truth,
he broke into sobs of gratitude. Days
and even weeks passed, however, be-
fore he recovered from the shock OF
hearing a compassionate word.
The police prohibited his show on
the ground Of public decency. So he
went TO Belgium, where again the po-
lice interfered. and where an agent
decamped with his money. Merrick
was left destitute and starving in the
streets of foreign town, where the
ignorant mob thought him a fiend.
He came back to London-how, no
one quite knows. At every station
and landingplace crowds logged him.
Steamers refused to have him on
board. But he came back to London
because in London lived the only man
who had ever given him kind word.
He made his way to the London hos.
pital, found Mr.. Treves. who had him
lodged for time in an attic in the hos
pital, and determined to find a per-
manent shelter for him.
But now it was found that no institu-
ton would receive him. The Royal
Hospital for Incurables and the British
Home for Incurables alike declined to
take him in unless sufficient funds
were forthcoming. to pay for his main
tenance for life He himself begged
that he might be placed in blind hos
pital. 1t is hard to match the pathos
of this plea.
Then in November, 1886, Mr. Carr
Comm, the Chairman of the LONDON
Hospital, wrote to the Times, asking
help for this case, and the British pub
lie responded. A room was built for
Merrick on the ground floor in q remote
wing of the hospital, and there, sur
rounded with books, flowers and hun
dred tokens of the kin dness that is
really quick in the public heart, he
has lived until this last week.
He had found many friends-the
Prince and Princess of Wales, Mr.
Gladstone, Mrs. Kendall, and others.
To Mrs. Kendall is due the happy sug-
g4stion that Merrick should be taken
to see the Christmas pantomime at
Drury Lane. She engaged the royal
box; she had him brought to the
theater, and took every precaution that
no strange eye could see him. Hidden
from the house. behind the curtains of
the box, the elephant Man, tasted an
hour or two OF intoxicating happiness.
1t was all real to him-the fairies tho
splendor. and the jewels.
Merrick, in spite of his hideous ex-
terror and terrible experiences, was in
his way a gentle sentimentalist, and
gushed forth at times, under the happy
conditions of his life at the hospital. in
verse modelled en- the hymns of DIR.
Watts, in which he gave utterance to
feelings OF gratitude, the sincerity OF
which none ever questioned. 1t was a
tender heart that was beating beneath
a mask more hideous than that OF
Orson.