Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-02-14
GOSSIP OF A BIG TOWN.
EIectrocution Is n Failure and the Law win
Be RepeaIed-A Guillotining in Paris

Be RepeaIed-A Guillotining in Paris
Tho Hotel Royal Firo-Tho French
Ball.
WRITTEN FOR THE DrsPArcH.i
We are q pretty fine human race, COM
paratively speaking. We have public
schools, philanthropists, poets, homes for
the aged and other Improvements. But
once in a while we find it necessary to kill n
fellow creature, just as we did when we
lived in caves, and with long red hair down
our backs ran into icy pools to escape the
mastodon that had turned on us.
1t is possible that we may finally give up
killing entirely, substituting for the death
penalty generous treatment of the poor,
universal education and some sort of inter-
ference with the breeding of criminals.
When that time comes these days of judicial
killings will be looked upon with the aston
ishment and desire for precise information
which mark our contemplation Of the old
days of torture. 1 am able to supply such
Information to the unborn future and to the
living present. I have seen men hanged
and guillotined, and on Monday witnessed
the application of the death penalty by cleo
tricity, that strictly fin de steele perform
ance by which earnest refor1ners, eager to
do good, have succeeded so admirably IN
emphasizing the brutality OF the times.
The GuflIotine Is Picturesque.
1t is not proposed to infict on sensitive
readers narrowing descriptions OF legal kill
fngs, but to compare briefly the three sys-
TENS that mark the highest types of civiliza-
tion at present. The most picturesque and
satisfactory to spectators and criminals is
undoubtedly the guillotining OF the French.
In 1885, on the Place dc la Roquette in Paris,
Prado, who murdered Marie Auguettant, was
guillotined according to law, just at sunrise.
The execution was public, except for the
fact that the enormous crowd that had
gathered during the night was prevented
from seeing anything by the mass of muni-
cipal guards and policemen.
The prisoner, a short, broad-shouldered,
bull.necked man with allow forehead walked
out cursing the priests on either side of him
and snarling at Deibler, the bearded execu-
tioner, who limped along in front. A lot OF
French reporters took cigarettes from their
mouths and raised their preposterous fat
top hats as they do when they pass
a funeral procession. Shaoowy forms in
night dresses appeared in the windows of
1apio apartment nonses n ApprDDp1riass Dpp1da
ing to the class whence Prado had chosen
his victim.
All Over in Tuinxling.
"A swift movement of Deibler's skilled
hands tilted the prisoner against the fatal
plank. 1t fell into position, the sfant1ng
blade, with 120 pounds of iron above it,
dropped from the height of the guillotine
posts, and it was all over before the mex
perienced spectators had fairly prepared
for the shock. In less than 30
seconds after he passed the door of the Ro-
Quette Prado's corpse in q hospital wagon
wasspeeding over the smooth pavement,
his head in one basket and his body in an |
other.
HANGING evervhodu knows oil about It |
itself to the practical English |
because it WAS cheap and disgraceful. Dogs |
and sheep stealers were hanged, ladies and |
gentlemen were bcheaded, witches burned, |
prisoners boiled. A growing Democratic |
feeling simplified the bill of fare until every
one was banged.
1t is a brutal thing, but murder is brutal. |
and so is the death penalty. Neither ap- |
proaches in brutality the so-called humane |
death by electricity. Monday number of
educated men. doctors and electricians, en- |
operated on human being with much less |
precision and humanity than is usually |
shown in the vivisection of rabbit. The |
rabbit at least is often rendered uncon- |
scious in advance. The man was not.
Tho First Current Didn't Kill.
AT first they decided that they would |
send the current through the murderer's |
hands under the impression that it would |
reach the heart more quicker in that way.
They put his hands in salt water and turned |
On the current 1t lasted for 90 seconds |
which means that an alternating current of
900 volts went into the mans body at the
ate of 800 shocks a second, 10000 shocks in
Ill. When the current was interrupted the
physicians began fumblinq at the mans
leck to see if he was dead. In the midst of
hat operation the mans breast heaYed, and
,roans issued from his breast.
1t was only the air in the lungs, the doc
ors said, but they announced, nevertheless,
hat the contact by the hands was a failure,
md the current was again applied, this time
% the head and the calf of the leg. The Sec
md application killed the criminal. The
irst had not killed him.
To see such men as were there engaged in
he experimental killing of a man was sufh-
,icntly revolving in itself without consider
ng the criminal at all. Had Sultan OF
Morocco procured a dynamo and expert
nented on one OF ms prisoners IN just sucn
way it would have aroused among us the
most intense Indignation The act of O Leg
Stature, urged on by well-meaning reform
rs, has caused us to adopt rs law practice
hat would disgrace lot of savages.
Educated Hangmen Indispensable.
Even assuming that men succeed ulti-
nately in producing an electrical killing
machine that shall annihilate its victim as
oes u lightning stroke, an electrician and a
hysician will always be required, not only
o testify to the proper execution of the law,
ut TO 90 Tile dCIlldl WOEk LndL HAS Deen
AIKEN away from the hangman. 1t would
e out of the question to turn even O mur-
erer over to the tender mercies of prison
rhrden and his turnkey, ignorant of cleo
ricity. Therefore the law depends on the
onstant Willingness of some self-respecting
nan to perform the functions of q Jack
fetch. After the scientific interest shall
ave worn or the impossibility of finding an
ducated executioner may save some muir
erer's life'and bring about the epeal of the
lectrical experimental killing law
In addition to the first electric killing
,ade public New Workers have had much
D talk about this week; the Hotel Royal fire.
he usual French ball, an excited stock mar
ct and their own interesting selves.
Dark Secrets of n Big Fire.
The Hotel Royal fire is without prece-
ent in New York. IL has caused more do
lestic unhappiness than any event in the
lemory of New York men. The character |
the hotel was notorious, and tho strange
,ene was presented of a man finding his
tangled wife in the hospital, leaving her
here with curses and OF relatives of miss
,g women eaQer that the search for bodies
lould stop and the dead be LETT in the
lins. The number of dead was undoubt-
lly tremendously exaggerated, as those I
ho escaped Immediately ran away, eager :
hide the fact that they had been in the
uilding. {
Endless romances have been concocted
nd are now told wherever men find listen
IS. One, probably AN invention, tells how
fireman removed his own disloyal wife
ON the top floor, forgave her on the way
own the ladder, etc. 1t is good idea,
Orth room in a novel. but probably not |