JANUARY AND FEBRUARY, 1895.
THE PRISON OF SAINT-MARTIN DE RE.
19 January, 1895.
My Darling:
Thursday evening, toward ten o’clock, they came to wake me to bring me here, where I arrived only last night. I do not want to speak of my journey, it would break your heart. Know only that I have heard the legitimate cries of a brave and generous people against him whom they believe to be a traitor, the lowest of wretches. I am no longer sure if I have a heart.
Oh, what a sacrifice I made the day of my condemnation, when I promised you that I should not kill myself! What a sacrifice I made to the name of my poor, dear, little children, in bearing what I am undergoing! If there is a divine justice, we must hope that I shall be recompensed for this long and fearful torture, for this suffering of every minute and every instant. The other day your father told me that he would have preferred death. And I—I would rather, a hundred thousand times rather, be dead. But this right to die belongs to none of us; the more I suffer the more must it impel your courage and your resolution to find the truth. Look on for the truth, do not waver, do not rest. Let your efforts be in proportion to the sufferings which I have imposed upon myself.
Will you please ask, or have some one ask, at the Ministry for the following authorizations; the Minister alone can accord them:
1. The right to write to all the members of my family—father, mother, brothers, and sisters.
2. The right to write and to work in my cell. At present I have neither paper, nor pen, nor ink. I am given only the sheet of paper on which I write to you; then they take away my pen and ink.