Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1899-08-05

al the comforts of home cannot live lon
ger than two years on end. Nobody be-
lieved that the despised and heartbroken
wretch could survive even SO long. 1t
seems that many actually wished for his
death, and now regret his coming back
to the land of the living once more, and
his friends maintain that the treatment
meted out to him was intended ito put
him out of pain" Sunstroke alone and
unaided might a killed him. And sew
eral times his jailers fancied it had, as
they carried his senseless body from un-
der the fierce rays that beat upon the
earth in the courtyard where he had
fallen, and flung him upon his bed in the
suffocating chamber inside. But gradu-
ally he revived. The strong will power
triumphed over the weakness Of the lac
Grated body, and lent it strength and en-
durance. AS he had to choose between
the fiery furnace of the little courtyard
and the thick, sitting atmosphere of his
cell, and often preferred the former. ne
over and over again lost consciousness,
and fell heavily to the ground as If
stunned by a blow from a death dealing
club. And each time the jailers would
shake their heads, and think, This time
he is done for in real earnest and they
would catch him by the head and feet,
carry him in, and fling him on his couch,
wondering at the rigidity of his limbs,
me- SiSdlAS OcSpuhc SatolSpSS "
And thus one attack followed the other,
rendering life a terror. yet death came
not. His jailers themselves grew weak
and fell i'll and left one by one, but Cap
tain Dreyfus endured and lived for the
supreme hour of justice and r~etribution.
Sunstrokes We're but one of an endless
series of physical sufferings. Fever was
another. TT fever which burns the very
marrow of ones bones and causes the
brain itself, as it were, to melt and seethe
in temporary madness permeated the soul
and racked the solitary dweller. Quinine
was the only palliative, and its efficiency
depended on it's abuse. AS it was a
choice between sunstroke out of doors and
suffocation within. so it become a choice
between the maladies caused by quinine
and the blood boiling, heart gnawing
fever.
Anaemia was one of the most frequent
and one of the most dangerous. 1t
threatened at last to end his torture and
his life. and his ~ja:lers did much to aid it's
work. For instance they suddenly stopped
the supply of preserves which he was
wont to receive from Cayenne, and at the
same time abolished his ratlons of milk,
condemning him the while to live upon
forms Of food which is stomach refused
to take. Dreyfus was sinking. But the
~superhuman will power of the man tri-
umphed again, and he still lived on while
his jailers were sickening and going home.
After some months of this wanton aggra-
walton of his hell upon earth, he was
again allowed to receive the preserves
and milk. For it is only just to acknowl-
edge that this treatment was determined
upon, not merely for the purpose Of in
fiict:ng pain. The captains friends hold
that its object was the less inhuman one
to hasten the end and obtain for the
prisoner a happy release. If so, it proved
Intellectual, and was finally given up.
1t is wonderful when one comes to
think Of it that Dreyfus should have sup
ported this unending ordeal, and escaped
madness and death. Frequent attacks of
sunstroke, numerous bouts of fever,
chronic weakness and anaemia, aggra-
waited by bad food, combined to under
mine his constitution, yet still the man
survived. Nor does that list exhaust the
series of causes that We're working to his
destruction. But the most maddening of
all, from which there was neither remedy
nor respite, were those moral %tortures
which no physician can probe and no
writer can describe. In his case they
constituted the worm that died not. At
first the prisoner used to receive letters
from his dearly devoted wife, sad mis-
sives, whose very sadness was balm to his
blighted soul. Then some Jealous public
servant suggested that these letters be
copied. and the copies alone given to him.
And this humane proposal was acted
upon at once without any Of the red tape
delays that commonly characterize be-
reaucracy.
Thenceforward he perused letters writ
ten in the handwriting of some copyist,
and was ever after deprived of the poor
consolation of contemplating the pen
strokes of his Widowed wife, of divin-
ing here a tremor in the gentle hand that
formed the word, of fancying there a
sudden influx OF energy born of hope, and
of dwelling on the spots blurred by the
tear of pity and of love. Nay, he had not
even true copies to read. His wife's let
tiers were mutilated, changed, tampered
with till he could no longer be sure whose
words he was Derusing. This may we'll
seem the most poignant stroke of all. But
1T was not. There was worse BILE.
and Dreyfus' executioners conceived and
realized it.
The correspondence between the lonely
prisoner on the island of the tortures and
his devoted but helpless Wife was wholly
suppressed. His letters to his lawyer
We're likewise stopped. Thus he was iso-
lated morally, as well as physically, and
left alone to endure all, without wen a
hope to look forward TO or an object to
attain. Life became worse thai useless.
Day after day dragged slowly onward,
week after week passed YEARLY away,
nut these changes OF umes ana altera-
tions Of seasons brought no tidings from
home. What further misfortune had Wis
tied those who We're near and dear to
him? Were they dead? Would they not
at least survive long enough to witness
fears and misgivings, the weird vision of
death, and the fearful perspective of
despair that chased each other through
the simmering brain of the wretched
man standing hus alone against earth
and eaven drove him to the very verge
of madness.