The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1902-06-01

Sdll, get Oul OIL lHelT WHICH dIe
torn off them where the menacles pre-
vent their easy passage and they
stand, naked and shivering, in the
prison courtyard. open your
mouths!" shouts the chief guard of the
four, and slowly each man is searched
all over, made to cough and sneeze,
and examined closely, in case he may
have brought money or tobacco into
prison. 1 will not enter into details of
this examination, they are too dis
gushing to be printed; but, strange as
it may seem, old convicts manage fire.
quently to bring money-both bank
notes and gold-into their captivity in
spite of it.
"To the bath" shouts the Chief In
spector. The bath is a basin contain
ing about six inches depth of dirty
water. The men take what they can
into the hollow of their hands, pour it
over their bodies, and-that is all. No
towels are allowed them and no soap,
and this bath is the only one they
get while they are at St. Martin de Re,
where some men stay d year and even
more. After the bath" each man is
given a cotton shirt and drawers, a.
brown wooden coat and pair of trous-
ers, and a wooden cap. The things
are filthy and patched out of all shape.
They are not changed until the con-
victs leave for French Guiana.
Until the ship leaves the men are
busted with oakum- picking and the
manufacture of paper bags.
The nights at st. Martin de Re are
terrible.
Each convict is chained to a camp
bed, plank five inches from the stone
floor of his cell, and covered with
vermin- eaten coverlet, which is quite
powerless against the cold. If they
1oir ba &c
taken from them, and they dispense
with it sometimes themselves, for even
cold is preferable to the torture which
the vermin in it cause them.
The st. Nazaire, the convict ship, is
ready. Each convict gets a cotton shirt,
a blouse, and trousers of the same ma
terial, and between double line of SOL
diers the gang is led on board and
taken to the hold. Each convict is re-
manacled, and sentry, with fined bay
onet watches over every two or three
of them. At the foot of the compan-
ion leading to the hold another sentry,
armed with a revolver-a warder or
garde chiourme. as he is callled-is sta
toned in a small cage day and night.
The comfort or discomfort of the
journey depends entirely on the ward
ers and their chief. These men are
usually Corsicans, and are always bru-
They rarely allow their prisoners either
talk or movement, and despite the stiff
ling heat which prevails in the hold,
the convicts get insufficient water, in
sufficient food and are CALLED almost to
madness by their irons, which are
never eased either by day or night.
The penal settlements consists of
Cayenne, the lie Royale, lie st. Joseph.
and lie du Diable. The treatment is
a in oil Of he Gfcro,. IL,
chiourme" reign there supreme.
Terrible Dungeon.
Once in the settlement the convlcts
are unmanacled during the daytime,
and are allowed the freedom of their
limbs. The cells in which they live are
small and fearfully stuffy, and are fl
thy beyond all description, infested.
too, with spiders, scorpions. ants and
other vermin A bench which runs all
around the four walls of each cell, two
tins, one for water and the other for
all toilet purposes @ form all the fur
niture.
Some times the convicts who have be-
haved exceptionally we'll are allowed
to sleep in a special guardroom, where
some ten of them are put together. This
room is not much preferable to the
cells, and the convicts are fastened to.
their planks as usual; but there is
more air there, and this, in the eli
mate which prevails in the French pc
nal settlements, is a real benefaction.
The dangerous convicts are shut into
the quarter special, a set of dungeons
half underground and with no ventila-
ton, for the windows open into a dark
corridor, into which no light ever fill
tiers.
After five years of quarter special
the convicts usually go raving mad
The work at the convict settlement
is hard, but not unduly so. The tor
ture of it consists of the awful climate,
and of the fact that the convicts when
at work are left in charge of the in
ferior garde chiourme. These men be-
have with incredible brutality They
have discretion over their wretched
charges, and may shoot a convict down
almost without question from their SUI
periors.
Welcome Insanity.
Some years ago a man who had been
two years in the quarter special and
could hardly walk was sent out with
a gang to carry logs to the sea coast
His weakness enraged the "garde Chi
ourTne," a Corsican, and furious at
what he called the convict's want of
will" this man laid hold of the wretch
ed creature and tied him to a tree with
MS IeeJ IN a nest OF white ants. THESE
venomous creatures with a semi-pois-
onous bite the Corsican stirred up with
the butt of his masket, and left the
convict in the broiling sun for sew
eral hours. At night when the prisoner
was taken back to his cell he was
laughing. He has never quite regained
his reason, and lives in Guiana, on a
ticket of leave, harmless, but quite in
sane. The Corsican has since been pro-
NOTED
From time to time protests are made
against such deeds. but Paris. official
Paris more particularly, shrugs her
shoulders. and answers that the men
who make the charges are themselves
returned convicts. upon whose word no
reliance can be placed.
There is some talk upon the boule.
wards. some writing In the newspa-
pers, perhaps a question Is leSSed in
the Chamber and a long oficial re-