Page:The Martyrdom of Ferrer.djvu/83

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THE INDICTMENT OF FERRER
77

people." I have before me a letter of this "leader of the people" (with whom, moreover, I have spoken on the subject) in which the fact is admitted and explained. Señor Moreno was at work in the organisation of the strike, and adds his testimony that it drifted into riot solely under stupid provocation. "On the Monday," he writes to an Anarchist friend, "I had a note from Ferrer making an appointment for half-past eight, in the railway station of the Paseo de Isabel, for the purpose of discussing the creation of a new school, for the 'Alliance,' a society affiliated to the Solidarity of Workers." There are previous references to this school in Ferrer's published letters. Moreno adds that he then told Ferrer about the organisation of the strike, which had been conducted with great secrecy. Ferrer had not worked with any of the groups co-operating in it, and they would not have dreamed of taking him into their confidence.

This entirely agrees with Ferrer's account of his movements, in a letter published in the Daily News on October 11. He explains that, as we know, he had much work at his publishing office, especially in connection with a forthcoming history of the French Revolution by Prince Kropotkin. He spent the whole day in visits to printers and publishers or in his office. He went to the station to take the train for Mongat, where he was staying with his brother, at ten minutes past six. The line was up, and he returned to the printer's house. Prudently, however, he concluded that Barcelona was unsafe, and he walked on foot to Mongat, where he arrived at five in the morning and remained until the 29th.

In another letter he describes his occupation during the period between his return from England and the outbreak. He was occupied solely in studying English works on the moral instruction of children—such works as Miss Alice Chesterton's Magic Garden of Childhood and Mr. Waldegrave's Teacher's Handbook of Moral Lessons. These and other works were read and annotated by him, and selected for publication in his schools. "Where are these dear books now?" he writes, before his condemnation. "They have been seized by the police at my house, Mas Germinal; but I shall, no doubt, have them returned to me later."