The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1911-09-29

rors of that hateful corner swell until
| they beset him at all times; invade
his rest, make his dreams hideous,
and his nights dreadful. At first,
he took strange dislike to it: feel
ing as though it gave birth in his
brain to do something of correspond
ing shape, which ought not to be
there, and racked his head with
pains. Then he began to fear it,
then to dream of it, and of men whis-
pering its name and pointing to it.
Then he could not bear to look at it,
nor yet to turn his back upon it. Now
it is every night the lurking-place of
a ghost, a shadow-a silent some
thing, horrible to see, but whether
bird. or beast, or muffled human
shape, he cannot tell.
When he is in his cell by day, he
fears the little yard without. When
he is in the yard he breads to re-en-
ter The cell. When night comes,
there stands the phantom in the cor
ner. Il he have the courage to stand
in its place, and drive it out Che had
once; being desperately, it broods
upon his bed. In the twilight, and al
ways at the same hour, a voice calls
to him by name; as the darkness
thickens, his Looms begin to live;
and even that, his comfort is a hid
eous figure, watching him till day
break
/ Again, by slow degrees, these hor-
rible fancies depart from him one by
one; returning sometimes, unexpect-
eddy, but at longer intervals, and in
less alarming shapes. He has talked
upon religious matters with the gem
tleman who visits him, and he has
/ read his Bible and has written a
prayer upon his slate, and hung it
up as a kind of protection, and an as
surance of Heavenly cOmpanionship
He dreams now, sometimes, of his
children or his wife, but is sure that
they are dead, or have deserted him.
He is easily moved to tears; is gen.
tie, submissive, and broken-spirited.
Occasionally, the old agony comes
back; very little thing will revive
it; even a familiar sound, or the
scent of summer flowers in the air;
but it does not last long, now, for the
world without has come to be the Wis
ion, and this solitary life the sad re-
ality.
IF his term of imprisonment be
short mean comparatively, for
short it cannot be-the last half year
is almost worse than all; for then he
thinks the prison will take fire and
he be burned in the ruins, or that he
is doomed to die within the walls, or
that he will be detained on some
false charge and sentenced for an
other term: or that something, no
matter what, must happen to prevent
his going at large. And this is nat
ural, and impossible to be reasoned
against, because, after his long sepa-
ration from human life, and his great
suffering, any event will appear to
him more probable in the contempla-
ton than the being restored to lib
erty and his fellow creatures.
IF his period of confinement has
been very long, the prospect of re-
lease bewilders and confuses him.
His broken heart may fiutter for a
moment, when he thinks of the world
outside, and what it might have been
to him in all those lonely years, but
that is all. The cell door has been
closed too long on all it's hopes and
cares. Better to have hanged him in
the beginning than bring him to this
pass, and send him forth to mingle
with his kind, who are his kind no
more.
con the haggard face of every man
among these prisoners. the same ex-
preston sat. l know not what to
liken it to. 1t had something of that
strained attention which We see upon
the faces of the blind and deaf, min
gled with kind of horror, as though
they had all been secretly terrified
In every little chamber that l enter
ed, and at every CRATE through which
l looked, l seemed to see the same
appalling countenance. 1t lives in
my memory, with the fascination of
a remarkable picture Parade before
my eyes, an hundred men, with one
among them newly released from this
solitary suffering, and l would point
him out
The faces of the women, as l have