in. But Sylver, in his agonies, begging and pleading for
help, was forced to pass that terrible night carefully locked in his
cell, and no heed given to his cries. Had they ended his sufferings with
a single blow, without any threats of the dungeon or gag, he would have
been thereby saved from the piercing agonies of those slowly dragging
hours. Would not that have been compassion in comparison with what they
did? But one says, "That would have been murder." True, and what was
that treatment in reality? With due care and attention the man might
have recovered, but they so proceeded that it was absolutely impossible
for him to live. No man with a lung difficulty could survive such
treatment. The blow of an ax, severing his head from his body, could
have been no surer means of death.

[Footnote 2: Important facts on this matter are withheld in the
narrative above, as the possessors were unwilling, at the examination,
to divulge them publicly except under the shield of an oath.]

I know the deputy attempted to exonerate himself from blame before the
governor and council, by asserting that the guard, sent for him, failed
to do his errand correctly, and that he understood himself called to
still the noise among the men, and for this sent the guard back.

Had that really been the case, why did not the guard go among the men
and endeavor to still them? Why go to Sylver's cell and expend his
efforts there? Or, admitting the deputy's statement to be true, did that
help the matter for him in the least? If summoned by the watch to quell
a rising tumult, was he, as an officer, acting the part of duty by
remaining quietly in bed and sending nothing but a guard to the work,
who could effect no more than the watch himself? All the circumstances
combined in forcing one, understanding the matter, to the conclusion
that they acted knowingly and intentionally respecting the man.

Do not understand me as charging them with intentionally and
deliberately murdering their victim, for this I do not, but that he fell
a sacrifice to a system of prison management that they were intent on
establishing; a system under which the officers are to be the sole
judges of the prisoners' needs, use them as they may choose, put them in
whatever condition they may see fit, and they in turn not allowed to
utter a word, nor give the slightest expression of feeling any more than
the dumb, driven ox. If they die, "it is of no account; he is only a
prisoner,"