The San Francisco call., 1899-08-22
THE SIEGE OF GUERIN.

ID all odds the cleverest display of strategy the
~ Partisan police have shown the world for many
- year is that by which they have turned
Gucrin's attempted revolution into a jest and Joke
for the raiery of the boucvards and the merriment
OF the world The siege OF Guern is in fact about
the brightest opera bouffe enacted on a munich
pal stage OF the first class
/ The bellcose Guerin has long been able by the
slashing tongue of him to talk valiantly leader
in the movement save France and the rest OF the
nations from the cosmopolitan putocracy OF the Jews
He has been mighty o Jaw in the Dreyfus hight, and
had he been Samson he would with that jaw have
slaughtered thousands When the Court OF Casa
ton ordered a new trial for Dreyfus the vehement
Guerin resolved to He organized band, which
was something like brass band something like
wind band. something like jewsharp and something
like barrel organ 1t was a resoute body OF men
determined on revolution, and when it approach
ing body OF police il took not the field but Guern 5
house fortified itself and called from the windows
upon the people strike for their affairs and their
homes. Guern and liberty.
The police declined treat Guerin seriously. In
stead OF battering down his door and dragging him
squeang through the streets prison. they simply
put 4 guard around his house shut off his gas and
water refused admittance To his baker, his butcher
and his grocerymau, and lett him TO harangue his
hand on the virtues OF holding the tort upon an
empty stomach
From the start Guerin has been dissatisfied with
such treatment He issued on the first day OF the
siege manifesto to Paris i'll which he declared that
on the day following the police aided by the army
would storm his fortress home and the Parisians
would see how hero can die He invited and
all to attend the sacrifice and promised ii they did
not rise 10 save him ne would die for them and give
then, show worth the Drlce OF admission.
The great day came, but the police did nothing
Some oi the more sympathetic of the crowd flung
oaves o bread and canned uxurics through the open
windows and Guerin ieaSted and talked and well
satisfied with himself, Day by day. however. he has
grown Sadder as we'll as thinner. On Saturday some
OF his friends undertook throw leg OF mutton ami
a five pound loaf OF bread through the window. but
missed. and the police confsoated the leg and the
loaf as contraband OF war
The mighty heart OF the revolutoniSt nearly broke
when lie witnessed the conhscation He had recourse
at once TO his never-iailing tongue.
In the nineteenth century YOU try TO starve peo-
pie Ii is disgraceiul You he added, addressing
the policemen. Won ought TO have heart than
your masters and ought to give back our provi-
sionS In any case I warn YOU that the FIRST time
companions arc hungry il 4 project OF police passes
along the street we will shoot him,
While this farce goes on in Paris the Dreyius case
drags on at Rennes The tragedy and the opera
bouffe move aong together. Nature is no respecter
Of dramatic properties She mixes the bufoon'S an
cS wi,h the sutferines Of heroes. and holds stead
lastly on her impartial way between the two; but
different from one another as is the in the pit
from the lion in the tolls. is the screaming revolu-
ZIONIST shouting defiance from his windows from the
heroic prisoner asserting his innocence and confront
ug his tocS at RenneS