River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1897-04-22
THE QUEENS PARDON.
ny Give HOLLAND.

On the heights of Portland the De
cember mist, still untiispersed by sun
rise. hung thick, celebrating all traces
of the prison buildings from the roads,
where several ships of the channel
squadron lay at anchor. and also from
the Struggling row of houses at the
base of the northwest slope. In the
prison itself there was no light as vet
save in the corridors. up and down which
the eyer-alert warders paced monot-
onOusiy to and fro. In most of the cells
the prisoners slept. tired out with the
previous days heUiug of stone and I'M
cOngenial tasks but in one the occu
pant. a man OF IS, good looking in
spite of prison garb, clOse-crOpped hair,
and the Tavsges of toll and despair, lay
on his bed awake.
a little more than ten years ago he
Lad stood in the dock of a west of Eng
land city listening to Judge with a
hard voice. though with kindly eyes,
prOnOuncing sentence of Is years pc
nal servitude. All that an eloquent
counsel could do had been done for him,
but TO no avail. The evidence seemed
cOnclusively damnatoTy, and the fore
man of the jury. after an absence of half
Bn hour, answered guilty" the usual
question with a ring of conviction IN
his voice. The judges words tn Thomas
IIarborde tell on deaf ears. lie stood
stupidity gazing at young girl sitting
at the back of the court in the COM
pany of a sweet faced old lady, as
though he saw nothing. At last ward
er touched him on the shoulder, and
the same instant a piteous cry of 20.
Tom! Tom! They're going to take you
away from me- rang out in the court,
over which the dusk of late afternoon
was creeping, gradually blotting out
the features of those who sat at all in
shadow. The prisoner turned round as
though about to say something to the
judge on the bench, and then. led by
the warder, he vanished down the dock
stairs TO the cells, to be known no long
err as Thomas Harborde, but by various
numbers: at Portland convict prison as
NO. o."
The sense OF innocence brought him
contrary TO all precOnceiyed notions
of writers of fictiOn-nO need of sat
isfactiOn; il merely filed him with
desperate wrath and blacklist despair.
In the early period of his solitary con-
hnement he found himself confronted
day in and out with the crushing sense
of the legiOns Of hours, minutes and
seconds before he could hope to be a
free man-if ever he were to be one
again. By good conduct-against the
very thought of which he at first re-
belled, refusing TO accept any boon at
the hands of faJe-he might reduce
these years to twO--hirds maybe. What
then, millions of seconds, each one to
linn, a prisoner, an appreciable part IF
life; hundreds of thousands of leaden-
footed minutes, each one filed with a
poignant despair. aust pass ere the
time of release drew near. At work.
under the scorching sun or in the
keen air of winter. in the quarries il
was all the same. These hours and
minutes became embodied in the per
cons of the warders and fellow pris-
oners, in the presence of his chains.
from a possibly dangerous man he be-
came almost an Illuminate machine; ;
n mere cogNheel in the round of daily
toll and prison discipline. At first he
attacked the stone rs though he were
Ievenging his wrongs upon human flesh
and blood, at last he toOled il with the
Unthinking regularity of an automaton.
Ii takes a year or two TO trample the
human element out OF a man of Har-
borde's type; but the effect of stone
walls, silence and brutsliZed cOmpan-
ions, IL slow. is none the less sure. Only
in his case he became an autOmaton in
stead of an animal.
Through the long December night
while the mist enshrOudcd Portland
and restricted the range OF the lights
ct the Bill TO half a mile or less. and
while the sirens sounded from the
lighthouse gallery almost continuously
answered family by others from YES
sells far out to sea, or booming
harshly from others near at hand
1larbOrde lay awake reckoning the
weeks, days. hours and minutes
which comprised the remaining two
years of his term. He had just dropped
of into housekeeping condition when
his cell door opened. and instead Of the
hard face of the warder come % tell him
10 tidy up. he saw the governor and
chaplain, with the warder in the back
ground.
What could it mean? lie sprang up
rubbing his eyes. and almost before he
knew what was happening the gov.
crnor had told him in few words tina;
he had received the queens pardon
aud then proceeded TO read the same
What did it all mean? No other thought
terminated in his dc'led brain. Freel
Free to 90 where he willedi Free towall
out Of the gaol gates, Never TO return
within the stone walls which had shu'
him in from the outside world. as surely
as though no other world than that con.
tained within them existed. The prison
hell Changed, startling him into a state
of wakefulness. The governor had fin.
ished reading the ofiicial-looking paper
and with the conclusion of the formal
part of his duty he added a few word.
Of congratulstiou. Harborde seemed 10
have comprehension Of their mean
ing. lie remained standing IN the cen
ter OF the narrow cell SPECIFICS. A:
last the chaplain made him understand
the import OF the document which had
just been read over 10 him.
"Freel Free! II is impossible he
exclaimed. and then he threw himself
on the bed in an sgony of joy. The
changing of the bell afresh. the slam.
ming of doors, the echoing of footstep.
down the resounding corridors. recalled
bim TO a sense of his position 4 warder
entered with a suit of clothes. With
trembling fingers he removed his prison
rarb: worn. soiled with weather and
labor ard intolerable. The trousers
felt chilly after the thick. tight-fitting
knickerbockers. aud rough. thick. wors
ted stockings. The coat seemed to 81
him nowhere. With one look round hi
cell, on the walls Of which he had don't
iunums-sble calculations to keep him