The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1902-08-23
POPULAR PLACES FOR SUICIDE


OF late the fashionable place to com
init suicide in Jackson park is on ''sui
eide corner" of Wooded island, near tho
japanese teahouse. If you do MOI
fancy Jackson park as a place fol
shutting off the mortal coil Washing
ton park affords a large, level greer
i field, which has been favorite place
in the past for those seeking to com
NIT felo-de-se, says the Chicago Chron
icle. In Lincoln park there are two
prominent places, one being the high
and commanding site occupied blythe
Grant monument and the other the
sedgy and quiet surroundings of the
lagoon. 49, -
The Wooded island in Jackson park
Is, above all places, the quietest and
most appropriate. There the hum of
the great city sounds in mighty, but
faint, diapason in the distance. The
limpid waters lisp and kiss the grassy
banks and the willows trail their slen-
der wands in the flow with soothing
sound. The birds sing in the trees all
around and the grass is long and cool
and green, and everything invites to
the last long sleep. The shrubs screen
the tired human from the curious gaze.
the grass affords a soft couch for the
last long sleep and the birds sing a
high obligato to the accompaniment of
the city's distant thunder, mingled
with the washing of the soft waves on
the banks. And these sounds have
been requiems for many in the past
few years. 1t is just such a place as
this that the lines of Omar Khayyam,
the ancient Persian poet, comes home
forcibly to the mind:
Why II the soul can fling the dust aside,
And naked on the air Of heaven ride.
Weret not .shame-were't not a shame
for him
IN this ciar carcase crippled to abide?"
"Ssieide corner" is just over the
wooden bridge that humps itself at the
north end of the wooded island in
Jackson park. It is one of the quiet
est places in the great green field and
the old and quaint Japanese teahouse
is the nearest sign of human habita-
ton. just now the shutters are all
up in the strange old structure and the
place is deserted Not far distant are
the lighthouses and the innumerable
little craft that dot the water, and
through rift in the trees and shrubs
may be caught a glimpse of the Field
museum, relic of one of the greatest
undertakings of the world, the worlds
fair.
Below the point the water is deep
and in the past it has been favorite
place for drowning. People wearied
of the ceaseless struggle and bounded
by misfortune or driven by guilty con-
sciences have leaped into the depths
and ended it all. The police in the
park have later fished out their life
less bodies and they have been hurried
to the morgue to await identification
by relatives or to be taken away to
he potter's field to rest in unmarked
graves. The officials of the south park
say the place has been the
scene of many suicides in the past
Few years, but they pay little atten-
ton to the grewsome occurrences.
When the bodies are found they are
taken away from the beautiful place
and the pageant of life goes on. The
park commission has very little SYM
pathy with suicides. anyhow. and does
not care to have the beautiful stretch
If lawn wet down with human blood.
It would much rather have it watered
With the rain and the dew. But the
little corner of the island which has
obtained the grim title has frequently |
been dampened by bright red human
yore and it is a wonder the flowers in
hat part of the park are not tinged |
With scarlet on account of the rudy |
PATHS.