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Show WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO BE CUILLOTINED. We know how it feels to be poisoned, to be hanged and to bedrowned, but it has been reserved for M. Mondate, an Italian gentleman, to let the world know, through La Defense, what it feels like to be guillotined. He was in 1873 condemned to death for a crime of which he was innocent and it was not the fault of the Italian justice that he escaped. The blade of the guillotine fell, but tbswoodin the grooves of which it ran had swollen slightly, and tho knife stopped barely two centimeters fromhisneck. While they were repairing re-pairing this defect a reprieve arrived; the true murderer had been found and had confessed his crime. "It was at 8a. m., August 17, 1S73," says M. 1 Mondate, "that my confeiaor, 1' Abbe" Fernia, entered my cell to announce to me that I must die. When at the touch of his hand upon my shoulder I awakened, 1 comprehended at once the nature of his errand, and, despite my confidence, it Beems that I turned horribly pale. I would have spoken, but my mouth contracted nervously and no saliva moistened it. A mortal chill suddenly invaded the lower part of my body. By a supreme effort I succeeded in gasping. 'It is not true!' The priest answered I how not what. I only heard a confused buzzir.g. Then a sudden thrill of pride shot through me. For some miuuteB I felt no fear; I stood erect; I said to myself that if I must die I should show them that an innocent inno-cent man died with courage. I spoke with ErP(if. mpiditv: I was hnrriblv afraid to be silent or to be interrupted; I thanked the governor of the prison, .! aL-oH fnr ynivml 1 1 i 11 f tfl fiat. TllOV brought me a cup of chocolate, but 1 refused it. Again I had become fully possessed with the horrors of my situation; sit-uation; I had visions of what the scatlbld would be like, and mechanically mechani-cally asked the attendants, "Does it hurt much?" "Not a bit," answered somebody, and I saw before me a new person in a gown of black woolen the executioner. I would have risen, defended" myself, asserted my innocence, inno-cence, but I fainted, and when I returned re-turned to consciousness I was pinioned pin-ioned in tho cut which was entering ihe death-place. 1 cast a shuddering look at the horrible machine. I had no more connected and coherent thought, and the uprightB between which the knife runs seemed as high as the m ists of a ship. I was lifted to tho platform; I had but one fixed idea that of resistance. But how could I resist? I was aeiznd ami flung down upon the- plank. I felt as if I were paralyzed and lay there for an immeuso lime. Then there wa3 a sharp blow oji my neck, and I fainted again with tho instinctive idea that the knife had struck me. It was not the knife, but the upper part of the lundte. When I came to myself 1 was in the prison hospital." |