Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1898-08-06
A FRENCH EXECUTION.
cRUESOME SCENES ATTEND THE
USE OF THE CUlLLOTlNE.

The Condemned Man Allowed Only
Twenty Minutes to Prepare For Death
After An Execution the Place Looks
Like q Shambles-A Morbid Crowd.
For the first time since the execu-
tion of the Anarchist Henry in 1894
the guillotine has just been brought
into use in Paris; and unpopular as it
may be as corrective of crime, there
can be no doubt as to its Theatre pos
sibilities with the Parisian public.
Although the execution was, accord
ing to French law, announced only to
chosen few, and although it took
place in driving rain at dawn
which is four o'clock-many thousand
people gathered at the Roquette
Prison to witness the gruesome sight,
and afterward made merry at the
neighboring cafes until far into the
morning. If there were Sunday bull
fights in Paris, as there are in the
southern cities of France, doubtless
no form of amusement would be found
more popular or more profitable.
From time to time the Paris press
prints articles, more or less violent,
upon the brutality of what it calls
"electrocution" "a form of carrying
out capital punishment which it be-
lieves to exist everywhere throughout
the United States. The French say
that to kill man by electricity is both
uncivilized and calculated to afford a
horrible spectacle. 1t would be per-
haps Improbable to argue over a
matter of racial opinion, but the
American who had seen French
guillotining never would recommend
the process for adoption in America.
The man who was decapitated re-
Gently, relates the New York Sun, was
one Carrara, an Italian, who, with the
assistance of his wife, murdered
bank messenger last autumn and after
ward burned his body. The crime was
not nearly so brutal as four or five
which occurred in Paris since that
time, the perpetrators of which were
duly acquitted by complaisant juries.
But Carrars was foreigner; which
makes no difference in the eye of the
French law, of course, but which,
somehow nearly always makesa differ
ance in the result of the trial. Carrara
is the seventh person out of over two
thousand guilty Of murder in France
in the last four years who had paid the
penalty of his crime by losing his
head. The others, according to
French statistician, are serving terms
in prison which average II little over
four years and six months, except
thirty or forty, who have not been
caught, and several hundred who were
acquitted on trial. Carrara, it is rec
ognized by many people whose opinion
seems to carry weight, was unfortun-
ate in his nationality and in his choice
of lawyer.
When a man is sentenced in France
he has, Of course, the right of ap-
peal, both to higher court and to
the clemency of the President of the
Republic; but when his appeal fails
he is executed at once without more
ado. That is why he did not know
his fate until twenty minutes before
he mounted the guillotine. His case
was settled at midnight, and, within
an hour afterward, the twenty five or
thirty officials which French red
tapeism prescribes as necessary to
oversee the formaities Of the execu-
tion were on their way to the prison
where the murderer was confined.
Already guard of cavalry, some mu
nicipal guards, and many platoons Of
police had been ordered out: the
chariot conveying the guillotine was
rumbling through the deserted streets
of the st. Antoine quarter, and NJ.
Deibler, the venerable Monsieur de
Paris" was speeding toward the same
goal in cab. Other cabs followed
with his many assistants.
The condemned man was awakened
out Of sound sleep, hustled into his
clothes, and then received the notifica-
tion of his fate in very long and very
howery Grafton from the lips of the
duly appointed Official. His legs were
shackled and his arms tied securely
behind his bach; then they tried to
march him out to the guillotine. The
speech. or something, however, had
80 weakened him that he could not
walk; so. after dosing him with half a
litre of rum, he was half carried, half
dragged out into the open space
in front of the prison, where
the guillotine had already been set
up, and where the executioners, sur
rounded by the soldiery and the great
crowd of curiosity mongers, were pa
tientIy waiting in the downpouring
rain
Then followed sorry sight. Deib-
ler, who is seventy-fve years old and
would have retired at the beginning
of the year had he not been desirous
of holding on to his $500 salary and
the rich perquisites of his Office, went
up to the condemned man and cut off
the collar of his shirt SO that his neck
would be bare. Carrara had not
faltered at the sight of the guillotime,
but when he felt the cold steel of the
shears on his flesh he began to struggle
and scream, and it took half dozen
men to hold him, pinioncd as he was.
Finally they picked him up bodily
and threw him fiat on his stomach on
the platform of the machine. 1t was
then seen that his head was not far
enough to reach to the lunette, and
they pushed him along by the feet. he
still kicking and crying out. All this
lasted for two or three minues; it was
the final fight which nearly always
takes place when a man is beheaded.
At last, however, the executioner's
assistants got the condemned man in
the right place. and held him there.
Deibler stepped to the head of the
machine, touched the lever which re-
leases the knife, and the 140-pound
blade, keen and shining, fell like a
trip hammer. There was sickening
slash. seconds silence, and then the
crowd broke out into yells. The
man head fell into basket on one
side of the knife, and his body con-