The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1898-11-15
LUCHENI'S FATE.
Imprisoned for Life and Doomed t,
Silence

G4A64C6-
Geneva, Switzerland, Nov. 15.-The
fate of Luigi Lucheni, the Italian an
archist who assassinated Empress Eliz-
abeth of Austria, will be, for an an
archist, the most terrible that can be
conceived. 1t will be total silence. He
viii not be made a martyr" He will
simply be shut up. set to work and for
hidden to talk
For the first five years he will be
confined to his cell and will perform the
labor assigned to him there. After five
years he will be set to work in a prison
shop and may not speak to any of the
lesser knaves around him upon pain Of
being returned to solitary confinement
He is not to be pampered; he may not
smoke or read or talk; he does not
know what the world is saying about
him. He will not even have the privi-
lege of standing in public on the gull
lOtine and having his head cut ora
blessed consolation to Valiant and
Henry and Santo Cessario. They looked
forward to it and glOried in it, and were
proud of chance to go under the knife
splitting curses upon society. But there
is no such hope for Luchenk
He is allowed no wine or beer or
spirits, and since that one famous cigar,
of which so much has been said, was
smoked he has not been permitted to
touch tobacco.
All the prison guards take turns in
watching his cell, and he has had little
chance Of getting special privileges. He
is allowed to receive no visits or letters
OF TO communicate WIN the WOIlO. All
sorts Of letters have been sent to him,
but he has seen none Of them. THESE
come from all parts of EurOpe-One OF
two from the United States. All the
letters received are not from sympa-
thizers. In one there came a bit of rope
and rough sketch of man being
hanged. This is what you ought to
suEer," says the writer.
The cantonal penitentiary Of Geneva,
the EVeche, is a gloomy graystone
building hard by the famous old Ca
thedral church of ST. Pierre (the Church
of John Calvin In the Rue de PEveche.
Some so prisoners are confined there at
present-an males. OF these only one
is a life prisoner, parrtcide, who has
already passed 16 years in his cell
Here Lucheni will enter never again
to come out. He will be put to work at
shOemaking. On Sunday mornings there
is a service in the penitentary chapel,
which Lucheni may attend if he wishes,
but as anarchists scOrn religion he may
deny himself this comfort. There is al
so a prison library from which the prls-
oners may each take a book every Sun
day. They are permitted to read on
Sundays and may also read at the din
ner hour.
Prisoners who have undergone this
punishment four or five years have de-
clared that they would prefer death.
Some have begged to be killed.
For Lucheni it will be particularly
hard. He sees before him life obso-
lutely without hope; the ceaseless talk
er will be reduced to everlasting 81
lence, the preacher of the bad cause Will
be without an audience and without
public the idle and noisy anarchist Will
be forced to work industriOuSly every
day of his life from in the morning
until at night and cannot even dispose
of the fruits of his own enforced labor.
If the anarchists have any wit they
may see a certain terrible irony an the
fa q Of TII4hRnk-