Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1905-02-22

the greatest living genius, was asked
it he had invented the apparatus
used in the two States whore mur.
dererers are electrocuted-- New York
and Ohio. The question was put to
him while he was in o state of great
mental perturbation, hnt his face
softened and his voice quickly lost
its fiinty substance when he replied
to the question on electroontion.
81 did not invent such an instru-
ment," he said, "and / am sorry that
electricity has been put to such bad
use. When the apparatus was being
installed at Sing Sing I went up to
look at it. The law providing for
such means of death had passed
passed to the horror of all men with
keen sensibilities, the love of human
ity and the fear of God in their
hearts. may have contributed
something toward simplifying the
method of putting men to death,
but if / did so 1 was moved by q
spirit that meant less suffering for
those condemned"
els eleotrocution the most painless
way of putting one to death?"
"Assuredly it is. There is SEN
sation of a moment only--as enick az
the bat of an eye. But in that seo-
ond there is-pain indesoribable. The
flash comes and the shock; it is ten
times more excruoiating than the
feeling that results from ones placing
his hands on live Goals. 1t is burn.
ing, devilish, narrowing feeling. I'm
agine the quick thrusting of ten
thousand hot needle points into the
body at one time, and you may have
faint idea of the shock when the
current is turned on.'
His blue eyes fell on the cracking
logs that lay burning in the big fire.
place before him. For minute he
sat wrapped in gloomy meditation.
Around him were miniature models
of his greatest discoveries-the tele-
phone, the graphophone, the electric
light, the phonograph, the storage
battery-dozens of mechanical con-
trivances that have given the world
incalculable benefits. His big yard
dog that had been lying before the
fire got up, yawned, stretched himself
and then walked over and put his
nose between his masters knees.
The greatest electrical inventor the
world has ever known thus was
awakened from his reverie. He con-
tinued:
81 am sorry the gallows was ever
thought of; the guillotine is 4 bar
barous instrument. The system of
garroting belongs to the Dark Ages,
and whatever may be said in behalf
of the present way New York has of
treating it's murderers, it is no less
ghastly and mex ausable than are the
instruments OF death used in the
semi-civilized nations.
1--WE call ours a country of ad-
vanced thought. Our men think and
feel and our women pray. But
we have not yet emerged from the
shadows that made the Middle Ages
text for historians. But it were
time that we threw off some of our
barbarity. This country is big enough
and rich enough and human enough
to lock up those who kill and make
them work. If it is the desire of the
law to punish, what mode could there
be that would carry more anguish,
grester torture than to enter Grim
inals in big house, they knowing
that from that moment they never
would see wild flowers, hear the songs
of children, catch the clasp of a
friendly hand, listen to words of
cheer, see the glories of the earth,
feel the freedom of the air? Could
one imagine condition worse? Be-
cause crazy man or woman, under
the influence of whiskey, or moved by
some devilish passion, slays his fell
low, is there any reason or excuse
why the State should murder him +?
That old Mosaic law-an eye for an
eye and tooth for a tooth-may