The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1899-08-14
CAPT. DREYFUS' SUFFERINGS
THE SUPERHUN1N WILL THAT
TRIUMPHED oYER TORTURE.
Inflicted Upon Him on Devils Is


The first stage was the public degra
cation. Then came the physical suf
1erlngs caused by the miasma of the
tropics, where even Europeans enjoying
all the comforts of home cannot live
Longer than two years on end. Nobody
pelleVed that the despised and heart
broken wretch could survive even Sc
long. 1t seems that many actually
wished for his death. and now regret
his coming back to the land of the liv-
ing 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
have killed him. And several times his
jailers fancied 1t had, as they carried
his senseless body from under the fierce
rays that beat upon the earth in the
courtyard where he had fallen, and
flung him upon his bed in the suffoca-
ting chamber inside. But gradually he
revived The strong will power tri-
umphcd over the weakness of the lac
Grated body, and lent it strength and
endurance. AS he had to choose be-
tween the fiery furnace Of the little
courtyard and the thick, sitting atmos-
phere Of bis cell, and often preferred the
former, he over and over again lost
consciousness, and fell heavily to the
ground as If stunned by 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. which clearly be-
spoke catalepsy or death. And thus one
attack followed the other, rendering life
terror, yet death came not. His jail
ers themselves grew weak and fell i'll
and left one by one, but Captain Drey-
fus endured and lived for the supreme
hour of justice and retribution.
Sunstrokes were but one of an endless
series of physical sufferings. Fever was
another. The fever which burns the
very marrow of ones bones and causes
the brain Itself, as 1t We're, to melt and
seethe in temporary madness permea-
ted the soul and racked the solitary
dweller. Quinne was the only palliative,
and Its efficiency depended on it's abuse,
AS it was choice between sunstroke
oul vi uUOlS anu SullOtdliOll Nllilllf 81
1t become a choice between the maladies
caused by quinne and the blood boil
ing, heart gnawing fever.
Anaemia was one of the most fire.
quent and one of the most dangerous.
1t threatened at last to end his torture
and his life. and his jailers did much to
aid its work. For instance, they sud-
denly stopped the supply Of preserves
which he was wont to receive from
Cayenne, and at the same time abol-
ished his rations of milk, condemning
him the while to live upon forms of
food which his stomach refused to take
and then at last the end hove clearly in
sight. Dreyfus was sinking. But the
superhuman will power of the man tri-
unphed again. and he still lived on
while his jailers were sickening and
going home. After some months of this
wanton aggravation of his hell upon
earth, he was again allowed to receive
the preserves and milk. For it is only
just to acknowledge that this treat
ment was determined upon not merely
for the purpose of inficting pain. The
captains friends hold that Its object
was the less inhuman one to hasten the
end and obtain for the prisoner 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
supported this amending ordeal, and es-
capped madness and death. Frequent
attacks of sunstroke, numerous bouts of
fever, chronic weakness and anaemia
aggravated by bad food, combined to
undermine his constitution, yet still the
man survived Nor does that list ex
haust the series of causes that were
working to his destruction. But the
most maddenlng Of all, from which
there was neither remedy nor respite,
We're 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 mssves,
whose very sadness was balm to his
blighted soul. Then some jealous pub
lie 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 char
actertze bureaucracy.
TheneeforWard he perused letters |
written in the handwriting of some
copyist. and was ever after deprived of |
the poor consolation OF contemplating |
the penstrokes of his widowed wife, of |
OWNING here tremor In the gentle
hand that formed the word. of fancying
there a sudden influx of energy born of
hope, and of dwelling OH the spots
blurred by the tear Of pity and of love
Nay, he had not even true copies to
read. His wife's letters were mutilated,
changed, tempered with till he could no
longer be sure whose words he was pc
rusing. This may we'll seem the most
poignant stroke of all But it was not
There was worse conceivable, and Drey-
fus' executioners conceived and realized
1t.
The correspondence between the lone
ly prisoner on the island of tortures and
his devoted but helpless wife was
wholly suppressed His letters to his
lawyer were likewise stopped. Thus he
was isolated morally, as well as physi-
,ally, and left alone to endure all,
without even a hope to look forward to
Or an object to attain Life became
worse than useless. Day after day
dragged slowly onward, week after
week passed YEARLY away, but these
no nr 1lI9rp fiOOS nf !