The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-09-11
Suspicion Growing that Both Lieut..
Col. Henry and Picard Were MUIR
dered by Corrupt Officials.
GEN. ZURLINDEN HESlTATES
NOT YET READY TO ORDER REOPEN
ING OF THE CELEBRATED CASE.
Minister of Justice Has Named a Conn
Old Evidence for Fraud.
tcopyrIght, 1sss. by the discounted pregs.l


Copyright 1885, by the Associated Press)
PARIS, Sept. Interpretation was disap-
pointed to-day. The Ministerial Council was
to have held d special sitting, with the OBJ
ject of hearing the war minister's account of
the Dreyfus case and the newly discovered
delinquencies OF the staff officers. But Gen.
zurlinden, finding he had not yet the
grounds upon which to form sound opin-
ion, asked for an adjournment
He is a serious, honorable minded, worthy
colleague of the conscientious Brisson and
was chosen to investigate the Dreyfus affair
as war minister, because he is not biased
and is weighted with a sense of the re-
sponsibility involved in the matter. Being
a Protestant and of bourgeois breeding, he
does not share the ultra Catholic anti-Jew-
sh feeling of caste at the War Office. Hav-
ing been a prisoner of war in Germany IN
1870 and being an Alsatian, he is warmly pa
triotic and would sympathize with the mill
tary Judges of DreyfuS should he find evil
dence of guilt. General Zurlinden was to
have given verdict to-day. If against re-
opening the case, he would have retired to
leave the government free hand. Judge of
of the disappointment when news was re-
ceived that the Council had adjourned.
The Dreyfus affair is in a good channel
The minister of justice has named SIX ac-
complished experienced, keen Jurists to ex-
anime the secret papers and everything con-
nected with the Dreyfus case The reopen
ing will entirely depend on this committee
Net one of the six is Jew, but one of them
M. Crepon, has been a student all his life
on Jewish history. He has written Mon
otheisn of the Jewish People," standard
work Another member of the committee,
M. Lopelletier, has found relaxation from
legal toll in Greek literature. He is the
author of Comparative Studies on Greek
Modern Drama" All six are men of unblem-
ished character and in the habit of sitting
evidence. The six will set to work directly
the war minister gives his opinion
The country being now violently anti
Semitic, and Dreyfus being Jew, the gov
eminent will have to act warily and creep
rather than walk forward. The late Lieu
tenant Colonel Henrys confession brought
public opinion round to revision, but the
hostility to Dreyfus is not abated. The peo-
pie feel that a mist of inquiry is involved
in the affair, and they want to penetrate it
They are beginning to understand that the
general staff is no better than when it rem
dered the military disasters of 1870 newt
able The resignation of General Boisdeffre
as chief of the general staff is a standing
puzzle and it arouses suspicious that only
q public trial can quiet. The people ask:
Was Dreyfus an accomplice of Esterhazy?
Were they both able to hold rods in pickle
for their superors? Was such power the
reason why the trial was strangely con-
Quoted and Dreyfus reegated to the soil
tude of Devils island?
The darkest conjectures are seemingly
justified by the circumstances connected
with Colonel Henrys suicide, which, the
Jews remark, was accomplished on the day
the Zionists' Congress broke up. That event
utterly dscredts the intelligence depart
ment of the War Office, and, indeed, dis
credits the whole general staff. No more
gruesome event has ever shocked human
sentiment and conscience, and though it
happened within sight of Paris it is
shrouded in mystery.
Colonel Henrys is the second suicide
nected with the Dreyfus affair. The first
suicide was that of LIE MERCER Picard, an
intelligence agent of the general staff of
Colonel Schwarzhoppen, the German mill
tary attache here and of the Italian en-
tassy. He was found suspended from a
lamp hook in a ceiling. Was he murdered?
Was he a suicide? The suspicious facts of
his death were hushed up by the late gov
eminent and M. Lepine, the former project
of police.
The reported suicide of Major Count Es-
terlazy was a canard. He knows where
too many skeletons are concealed not TO
feel safe. He will die a natural death, but
fresh revelations may lead others to imi-
tate Colonel Henry.
The Furies, as in the Greek tragedies,
seem to enter into this drama. The fall IF
General Boisdeffre brings the drama home
to the imperial court of Russia, where, as
a brilliant aristocratic military attache, he
was a great favorite. He was admitted to
the intimate festivities of the imperial fam
lily and was favorite Waiting partner of
the Empress Dowager in her dancing days.
The French republic sent him and special
embassy to the late Cars funeral and to
the present Cars coronation. Great sums
of money were allowed him to cut dash.
Finally, President Faure took him to ST.
Petersburg to assist in the preparation of
the Franco-Russian treaty Why such a
great parsonage demeans himself with
Henry and resigns splendid post passes
comprehension. The re-opening of the
Dreyfus case may solve the puzzle.
EMIT " (Il UVENDn