Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1918-09-05

successor, Louis XVI, credited with being am
liable ruler forth 14.5OO their missions of
oppression.
1t might well have been written over the en-
of the Bastille He who enters here.
leaves hope behind" The place realized the dark
est visions of Dante's Inferno. Separated from
the streets of the city by moat 125 feet wide
and % feet deep, and accessible only by draw
bridge. it was like an Isle of the Dead.
In its noisome dungeons abominable cruelties
visited upon unfortunate prisoners. who
were condemned the rack and the boot and the
wheel, chained to pillars and logged There
were circular cells with conical tops, in which the
inmates could neither stand erect nor sit nor lie
The roll of the sufferers of the Bastille is long
Various degrees of punishment were melted
the prisoners according to the whims of
the sovereign. Some of them, like the Man with
the Iron Mask, for time prisoner liz the Bas-
tile. treated with consideration: They
had bounteous meals and were assigned to rooms
in which there a fair amount of light, and
were even permitted to walk in the garden.
They had scant enjoyment, however. for they
knew when they would be doomed to the
fate of their less favored fellows. Men lived 80
and 60 years in the Bastille. until they lost
all connection with the world beyond the mOat.
In that world toward the close Of the eighteenth
century mighty changes came to pass. The line
of the Louis had SO impoverished the nation that
the national credit fmperiled. When Louis
XVI came the throne debt of SOOOOO,O0O had
been piled up and it continued to pyramid. The
common people had been footing the BILL and
came the proposal, strange in those days, that
nobility and the clergy the privileged classes
should share the burden with the Third Estate.
1t day of questioning and hearken1ng and
soul searching The words of Voltaire, Rousseau
and Diderot were sinking deep into the national
consciousness Hence assemblies to talk over
these proposals.
In vain were the prisons filed with agitators
and the voltaires sent into exile. The storm
gathering. If the monarchy was to be sustained
exIravagance and feudalish to be upheld
the mailed fist must do its work But there
deal with than murmuring serfs and
handful of encyclopedias The soldiers of France.
who were expected to uphold the old regime,
showed that they UNIV filing to kill their ia
theirs and brothers like dogS-
The people of Paris ranS.cked their city until
they found arms or the material for making
pixies The time had when the rights OF
should prevail and men who are starving
under tyranny easily recruited AS the forces
OF the new order grew they thought with one ac-
cord of the hated symbol of that CALLING oppres-
sion which the of all their suffering.
The cry ITO the Bastile =" from hundred
thousand threats.
tive as popguns would be against dreadnaught
moved against the ancient stronghold Bullets
battered and fattened against the massive walls.
The defense only half hearted, and the
French guards the battlements were soon wav-
ing flags of truce. A force greater than all the
munitions ever made was at work-a public senti-
ment which had become reSistless torrent De
launay, the governor of the Bastiile uembled be-
fore it and surrendered. Down came the creak-
ing drawbridge and across 1t rushed the fnfuri-
~ated citizenry- The tide flowed In and out OF the
dim corridors and searched out the narrow cells
AS soon there the semblance of govern
ment arrangements were made for removing the
Bastille. The work took the contractor nearly a
year, although he employed a large force. There
was thriving business In its relics. for hundreds
of the blocks of Stone were carved into models
of the prison and sold as mementoes- Locks and
bolts distributed all over the world rs
souvenirs
Although the demolition of the Bastie itself
proceeded, the thing for which 1t stood was not
SO easily swept aside. Feudal Germany and
Austria blocked the road to liberty. We OF this
day,-wfth the perspective of a century and more
of history and belonging to nation which Is even
now in arms against the powers which sought to
foist the yoke ef seEfdon once more upon the