The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-07-27


of political prisoners in Portugal. Denials
of her statements and descriptions were
later forthcoming. but chiefly from
sources that are open to the charge OF
bias 1t was to discover the true facts
and to give them to your readers free of
prejudice that your correspondent has
made the fullest possible inquiry into the
treatment and present conditions of the
political prisoners in Portugal and into
the administration of the two prisons-the
penitentiary and Lemoiero-that have
been chiefly attacked. The following
story is his account:
copyright, 1913, by Curtis Brown)
+ IsBON. July 26.-(Special. AFTER the
fullest possible inquiry into the con-
- ditions under which the men who
took part in two attempts to win back the
country for Manuel and the monarchy
are now living in the .penitentiary and
Lemoieiro prisons the writer's opinion is
that those prisoners are lucky in spite of
the stories that have been told of their
terrible hardships.' When it is remem-
bered that these men participated, in one
country and that they threaten a real
danger not only TO the republican institu-
tions which have been estahlished-in
some degree at least-snce Manuel and
his court fed before the comic opera rev.
olution but to the freedom and perhaps
the lives of the men whose word keeps
them behind bars. the consideration with
which they are treated is truly astonsh-
ing. And when l add that they would
probably have been freed long ere this,
with a few exceptions perhaps, had 1t not
been for what might call questions of
home politics, it will be seen that their
punishment is by no means out of pro-
portion to their deeds.
This opinion does not rest solely upon
an abstract consideration of the circum-
stances of the case. 1t was formed after
seeing not only the prisons, but, well
many of the political prisoners. And both
at the pententiary, where upwards of "a
hundred of those who have been sem
fenced to long terms, and at the Lem
oiero prison, where are kept much
smaller number of short term men,
found the prisoners in good humor, ap-
psrently as nappy as men coulu pe uhuef
forcible restraint, ON excellent terms of
friendship with their jailers, and treated,
not as common criminals, but as equals
who, in the game of political intrigue,
have been unfortunate enough to have
lost for the moment.
The penitentiary Portugal's chief pris-
on, lies some distance outside of Lisbon.
On your way to it from the city you pass
the military barracks from which
marched forth the few hundred troops
who responded to the call of the repub-
lican plotters and who, because of the
muddling of the loyal officers, carried the
revolution through to success. Built in
1886 after the plan of the prison at Lou
vain. in Belgium, the penitentiary is one
of the best prisons | have ever been in
and have been In many-not only on this
side of the Atlantic, but in the United
States 1t is built in the form of six
wings converging on a center tower in
such way that one set of guards, sta
toned in this tower. can view all the
wings from their station. The wings are
in three tiers with cells on both sides
There is plenty of light from the inside
and every cell has a ws,dos vsoolSing out
on the court between it and the next
wing.
The day on which l went through the