being able to bribe a jailer to post a long letter to M. Malato, at Paris.[1]
In this guise he was the same evening brought before the examining magistrate, or military man acting as such, who questioned him as to his movements during the outbreak. This magisrate, he observes, showed a spirit of justice and honesty, and Ferrer concluded that his detention would be brief. Witnesses to his story could easily be procured. Apparently this magistrate was a man of honour. The case was taken out of his hands, and Ferrer never saw him again. He spent nearly a week in a squalid dungeon, without air, warmth, or light, and infested with swarms of vermin; and he was refused soap and water for several days.
Five days later he was again summoned. It was a fresh military magistrate, a polite, correct Spanish gentleman, but—we shall see what happened. The first day was spent in a fruitless attempt of the military surgeons to find marks of fighting or burning on his person. Another delay, and then the magistrate discussed his movements in Barcelona, and laid great stress on certain revolutionary sentiments which were attributed to him in a Freethought Almanack published in Brussels in 1907. Ferrer at once pointed out that this passage referred to his youth, and that in this very article he expressly avows that an adequate education of the people is now the sole work of his life. He had written the notice—which I have before me—himself. But from this and certain letters they had obtained, and were wholly misrepresenting, he saw what kind of a case was being made up.
The next visit completely opened his eyes. While Ferrer was hiding, the police had, on August 11, searched his house in the presence of his family. After twelve hours' search by a band of twenty agents only three articles were thought worthy of removal—a letter from a Paris friend to his brother Jose, a key belonging to Lerroux (a leader of the recognised Republican party), and a note indicating that he had lent some £30 to a working-men's society. Of this Ferrer was aware, and felt some security against misrepresentation. To his astonishment, at the third visit to the magistrate, a month
- ↑ Facsimile pages of this letter are given in the life of Ferrer which the Committee of Defence have just published at Paris.
