The Clio messenger. (Clio, Mich.) 1907-current, 1914-09-18
TAKING THE BRUTE
OUT OF A CONVICT
Jonas Szikely Was a Savage,
Half-Witted Beast.
WAS CONVICTED OF MURDER
Surgeons Lifted a Little PIeoo Of His
Skull and Now He 10 a Man,
Mild Tempered and
Intelligent.

y
walls Of the state prison ramble about
an area that would normally repre-
sent several full blocks in somewhat
dubious residential district.
The main gate of the penal house Is
Of ponderous brownstone, relic OF
eighty years ago, when 1t was set
there, with its futed lotus columns
and its wise Egyptian serpents reach
ing their cynic tongues at the war
den's home across the street.
The subtle snakes have been there
watching men come and go since time
began for the prison. In their eighty
years the serpents have watched the
toll Of immured men run into the
many thousands. In their eighty years,
too, they have grown wiser with the
seasons.
But nothing they have learned is
rarer than the case Of Jonas Szikely-
nothing marked with more curious
wisdom, slow in coming, but come at
last.
It Is September, 1910. Jonas Sci
kelly, fifty-four years old. a laborer in
the coal mines near Belvidere, N. j.
II huge, bovine, helpless manages to
attend a carousal In a Hungarian
boarding house In the little town and
drinks more than is good for any
mortal.
Eight or ten other Huns, rough Ia
boring men, too, are at the boarding
house, and whisky has mastered them
all before much of the night is gone.
There is a brawl; one man is stabbed
70 death
Pleading Guilty.
Several men try to escape from the
boarding house, as men will when a
sudden and terrible thing has been
done, innocent though they may be
individually. The police and the mob
attack Jonas Szikely to prevent his
escape.
He is captured and thrown into Jail
with nine other Hungarians. He Is
badly hurt and what he says has no
rhyme or reason In 1t. Mostly he
bowls and cringes.
When ne Is arraigned an ambulance
surgeon examines his cuts and says he
has a scalp wound. It is treated as
such and the man Is cast back into
prison to await trial and sentence.
A lawyer is provided for him so that
he may have his rights, but he under
stands none Of these things. His head
hurts terrifically. He is irrational.
Even in full possession Of his facul-
ties he, likely enough, would not have
understood how to save himself
In few weeks he is led into court,
where a Judge, come hastily from an
other town, is sitting. He pleads
guilty to murder in the second degree
and Is sentenced to go behind the
lotus columns and the wise serpents
for thirty years.
He does not know just what has be-
fallen him or why these things are.
It is said his scalp wound was In
ficted by a pickax handle welded by
one Of the mob after the killing, but
that is not certain. Another story
says he received the blow in the
brawl. What matter? In thirty years
no one will remember-or care.
Like a cave-Dweller.
In October, 1910, they brought to
the gate of the Trenton prison a sad
and fearful thing which might have
been a man. In its present state 1t
was only a great, hulking brute,
epeechless and empty-eyed, save at
rare moments when some cryptic light
came into them.
1t was not ferocity nor yet hatred,
but dull probing, a hurt inquiry as
of some beast wondering at its cage.
This thing had long arms that
seemed longer than they actually
we're. 1t carried its shoulders hunched
forward In a queer position that
added to the Illusion. The hard,
round head, the sloping forehead the
prognathous jaw and the empty,
searching eyes made up this picture
of some cave or forest thing.
But they called 1t Jonas Szikely
and dressed it In" Henceforth It
was known by number and locked
into n small steel cage like the brute