course, from a list of officers submitted to him—he said that he knew none, and trusted none, of them; but he selected one whose name resembled his own (Francisco Galcerán Ferrer).
The "act of accusation," however, is followed by the "fiscal accusation," the real speech for the prosecution. The former had been a simple recital of the statements made by witnesses on examination. The latter is a very long and oratorical manipulation of the evidence in the interest of the prosecution. It would have needed a trained magistrate to follow with balanced judgment its appalling sophistry, its wilful confusion of positive and hesitating witnesses, its culpable quotation of letters without saying if they belonged to Ferrer's earlier or later period. As Gil Blas editorially comments (October 14): "The process went on with a brutality of procedure rare even in the annals of courts-martial." I will notice such new scraps of "evidence" as are introduced in this venomous speech.
With Captain Rafales's lengthy proof that the events of July constituted a rebellion we are not concerned. The sole question is whether Ferrer was, as he claimed, "the head of the rebellion." To prove this he unblushingly quotes the evidence of "witnesses who are beyond suspicion because they have themselves been arrested"—as we saw, they earned their liberty; of witnesses who depose "on information that they have not the means of controlling, but believe to be exact"; of witnesses who (being in prison for burning convents) "share the general opinion" of Ferrer's guilt; and of witnesses who merely declare that the tumult increased after Ferrer's visit to Premia—as if it would not naturally increase after the early morning. These "fifteen witnesses" are declared to prove Ferrer's guilt. Then comes the egregious barber, who offered Ferrer drinks and lunch, and went about with him, not noticing, until he was asked by the police, that they were engaged in revolution; his testimony "proves" that Ferrer was head of the insurrection. The evidence of the soldiers that Ferrer (or someone they afterwards believed to be Ferrer) protested when they wished to disturb him as he read the proclamation just posted up is pressed as "of evident importance"; whereas it is not disputed that Ferrer
