Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-04-21
MONSIEUR De PARIS
Last of the GuiIIotinerS is
AnatoIe DeibIer.
CAPITAL PUNISHMENT GONE
Says Severed Heads Can Think
and Feel.
HEAR THE ROAR OF THE MOB
Cafe Companions Keep the Secret of
His Nom de Plume, but Never
Shake His Hand.
HEAR THE ROAR OF THE MOB

| Special Correspondence of The Star.
PARIS April g. 1907.
! Il helped my father cut off heads" he
| said with gentle melancholy, and when
| father died last year. I took his place-Ill
| tell you why. Officially 1 am high execu-
| toner of Franee; but as the new budget
has dropped my allowances, my occupa-
tons gone-the occupation of my family.
| The speaker was the last of the guillo-
timers. I had called on him in consequence
OF Crupprs announcement that parliament
after the coming great debates-will sure
ly abolish capital punishment Jean Cruppi
Is president of the judicial reforms com
| mission. Anatole Deibler is Monsieur de
| Paris.
! THE last of the guillotiners.'' he re-
peated. MY father cut off heads. His
father cut off heads: he was Monsieur
de Rennes and the five departments of
Brittany. With the stain so long in the
| family, what else could 1 do? And do you
| know" he added, bitterly, Il took the oc-
| cupation up out of despiteful pride-my
mother also had the odium! She was daugh-
| OF Algiers.
| ] ooks Like a Poet.
| Yet he looked like a poet-a modern
| poet, or, say. a prematurely bald young
| doctor given to poetry and the love Of
| flowers. We stood in his smart villa gar
den, heavy with the perfume of volets.
primroses. daffodils, crocuses and early
| Towering shrubs.
| Where is the guillotine?' | asked al
! most ashamed; but he took me to it kindly,
| in little house constructed for it spe-
cially. on a side street-No g. Rue de la
| Foie-Regnault, Brillancourt-the most
a n fla.l h nEn
of Paris criminality.
There stood the awful instrument. invent
| ed for the killing of entire aTistocracy a
century ago. Its massive blade Shone. Its
pulleys were oiled. Its ropes We're WIXed.
There was a sliding board with straps.
There We're four wicker panniers, like en-
larged champagne baskets. There We're
four wooden cases, large enough to hold a
man-without his head!
Does it hurt?" | asked.
I'VE have tried to believe it painless"
answered the strange young man. The
brain shock given by the falling Of that
| heavy-leaded blade from a considerable
height ought to produce Immediate coma,
and before the brain can, theoretically, re-
cover, the several head has lost its blood
how can mental action set up? During
| the revolution and up to fathers time. the
operation consisted Of two parts: fixing the
neck in the lunette, or little round window,
| to hold it steady, and pulling the catch
trigger which causes the blade to fall. Be
tween the two operations there was a long
and agonizing moment Thanks to an in
vention Of father, the upper movable half
Of the lupette and the blade fall almost 81
multaneously-to the immense surprise Of
the victim, 1t must BET
He never knows what struck him." l
suggested.
tated the last of the guillotiners. almost
unwillingly. In 1880 the famous Prof
Sappey and DR.. Dassy de Lignieres OBJ
tanned permission of the prefecture to ex-
l ri ont hn fraCh Of hnn1 Of fhn
assassin Menesclou. They made a liga-
ture in the left carotid artery: adapted a
tube Of caoutchouc to the primitive right
carotid-and branched the other end in
the central terminal Of the left carotid
artery of large and robust living dog.
There was a spigot to regulate the blood
torrent"
"Well?" 1 asked-my mouth was dry.
when all was ready they turned the
spigot. The dogs blood shook the tube as
1t dashed In, spreading, hot and alive.
through the whole vascular network of
Menesclou's head. The white dead face be-
awaking; the eyes opened with a look of
establishment; the lips trembled, as If try
ing to speak. During two seconds, said my
father, that brain thought. Then Prof.
Sappey told him:
Heard the Mobs Roar.
"Deibler. be gentle and respectful with
your heads! When the knife has done its
work, when they roll in the sawdust. those
heads hear the of the mob. They
perceive their bodies dying in the basket.
They see the gullotine-and the light of
day"
In silence quit the shed In silence
Anatole Deibler locked the door. Slowly
we strolled through springtme Bilan-
court. coquettish suburb of fair Paris.
Each time after exercising his office, my
unhappy father fell prey to blacklist melan-
choly" monologued the of the guillo-
tine. Not even mother dared approach
hin-shut UP in a darkened room. head In
hands, vainly seeking to Danish from his
mental vision the long procession of-our
victims! Only solemn music could soothe
these storms of sadness. An old friend of
ours, consummate pianist. would be ready
to play for him, in the darkened room, frag-
ments of old masses. Chuck, Haydn.
Mozart = =" Once, as boy, 1 peeped
into the room Shaking his head slowly.
automatically, he was murmurlng; so
many. so many!'
You never have had execution OF your
own" 1 said. to relieve him.
mo, but l aided father often, often; and
one comes to feel weighed down by a
mournful sense of family responsibility. l
remember hearing my aged grandmother
tell of her solicitude as a young mother.
when her little SONNY father-began ask
- Papa is travelling she would tell the
child, when the necessities of his Office
took him away.
Papa Is traNellnS tue boy WOulu pratt
tie. But he grew. Then one day, answer
ing a neighbours thoughtless question, he
spoke up of his own accord defiantly:
Papa Is traveling!'
'And she knew that he knew! I myself
learned the thing at boarding school, when
nine years old. One afternoon the other
boys refused to play with me-.
Office Handed Down.
In France it is not as with us. where
such dread responsibilities are diluted
among a thousand sheriffs, occupying for
short terms an Office otherwise highly hon
orable. Under the old regime of kings
there were always individuals whose life
work was to whip, brand, hang. behead.
break on the wheel burn and torture. In
the name of the law.
1t was natural for the ill-famed, WELL
paid Office to run in families. The famous
Sansons held 1t through generations, from
1858 down to 1874. and but for the interview
ing terms of Roch and Heinderich. the
Deiblers have been their successors
Why did l take up the Officer" unused
the cultivator of daffodis. "Why did my
father take it w? What else could the
young man do in life? The stain follows
My father was the son of the guillotine,
and there was not a girl in France who
would have married him.
/ cannot describe the painGllneSs of this