The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-09-15

men were stood Is scared with bullet marks, but prisoners have ceased to re- gard it with the terror they once might have felt and prison officials have fal- len into the habi; of regarding it more or less as curiosity rather than as a |, part of the working machinery of the institution.
 The last time prisoner was stood be- fore that wall was following the fa- nous assault of band of robbers on a jewelry store in Plateros street. The place was footed and the proprietor, an old man, was murdered at time when i the street was crowded. One of the robbers was Bruno Martinez. His exc cution was probably one of the most sensational as well as the last that was ever witnessed in Mexico. He had se- cured knife, and at the hour of death ran amuck, wounding the chief of de- tectives and creating almost panic before he was finally overpowered and forced to receive the bullets of the fir- ing squad.
 Merely taking advantage of the op- p9rtun!ty offered by law serves to ena- ble the condemned man in Mexico to escape death for many months, but af- ter every appeal has besn taken it is a question of communication or execution. Possibly no man condemned to death can rest with assurance that by exer- else of official clemency ha will escape death, but it is doubtful if there is an attorney in the country who would not feel almost confident that in the end he could obtain for his client commu- tation of the sentence to twenty years imprisonment.
 This condition of affairs is due large ly to the feeling in the matter enter | tained by the chief executive, but a few years ago there was issued in this country flood of literature giving the arguments against capital punishment These works were widely read, and the sentiment thus created has doubtless done much toward reducing the number of capital punishments.
 As long as capital punishment is au- thorized by the laws of the country 1t is probable that the method of eXecu- tion will be shooting, This method of legally sending a soul into eternity is one that causes the people of other countries to shriek with horror. but af- ter all there probably has never been i suggested a more, humane means of ending the life of a man. If there can be assurance that the men with the ri- fles shoot straight there can be little doubt that death will be as nearly in- stantaneous as that prescribed by any other method. '
 Certainly at the time Mexico adopted the method of shooting it was an i'm l not worse and not better than hanging if a merciful executioner stood behind the post. But not every executioner in the days when the garrote f1ourished was merciful being. It was the gar rote the Spaniards brought to Mexico. As long as they retained their power here it was the common machine of ex- ecution. On the retirement of the spaniards the firing squad took the place of the exeehtfoner and theft ri. tles the place of the garrote.
 Executions of soldiers for infringe ment on military discipline are still not uncommon, but even executions of this class are more rare now than they once were, and it is nqt1impossbole that the day may come when it must be an ex- ceedingly graver"afrd atrocious crime
 that will bring for the perpetrator, whether civilian. or soldier, heavier sentence than that which can be given within the prison walls.-Mexican Herald.