Now the punishment is insufficient for those who defy it; useless for those who are already morally dead; excessive for those who repent with sincerity. Let us repeat it: society does not kill the murderer to cause him suffering, or to inflict the lex talionis; it kills him to prevent him from doing harm; it kills him that the example of his punishment may serve as a warning to murderers to come. We think that the punishment is barbarous, and that it does not sufficiently terrify. If this assertion is doubted, we will recall many proved facts of the deep horror expressed by hardened criminals for solitary confinement. Is it not known that some have committed murders in order to be condemned to death, preferring this punishment to a cell? What, then, would be their horror, when blindness, joined to solitary confinement, would deprive them of the hope of escape—a hope which he preserves, and which he sometimes realizes, even in a dungeon and loaded with irons. And touching this matter, we also think that the abolishment of capital punishment will be one of the forced consequences of solitary confinement; the alarm which this punishment inspires the generation who at this moment people the prisons and the galleys, being such, that many among these incorrigibles prefer to incur the highest penalty known to the law, than imprisonment in a cell; then, doubtless, the punishment of death ought to be suppressed, in order to sweep away this last and frightful alternative.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
MARTIAL AND THE SLASHER.
Before we pursue our narrative, let us say a few words touching the recently established connection between the Slasher and Martial. As soon as Germain had left the prison, the Slasher, who easily proved that he had robbed himself, confessed to the judge the reason of this singular deceit, and was set at liberty after receiving a severe and just reproof from the magistrate. Not having then recovered Fleur-de-Marie, and wishing to recompense the Slasher (to whom he had already owed his life) for this new act of devotion, Rudolph, to crown the happiness of his rude protégée, had lodged him in the mansion of the Rue Plumet, promising him to take him in his train when he returned to Germany. We have already said that the Slasher felt for Rudolph the instinctive, faithful attachment of a dog for his master. To live under the same roof with the prince; to see him sometimes; to await with impatience a new opportunity of sacrificing himself for his interests, were the limits of the ambition and happiness of the Slasher, who preferred a thousand times this situation, to money and the possession of the farm at Algiers which Rudolph had placed at his disposal. But when the prince had discovered his daughter, all was changed: notwithstanding his lively gratitude toward the man to whom he owed his life, he could not resolve to take with him to Germany this witness of Fleur-de-Marie's first shame. Determined in any other manner to satisfy the wishes of the Slasher, he sent for him for the last time, and told him that he expected a new service from his attachment. At these words, the Slasher's face brightened, but it soon became clouded when he learned that not; only must he not follow the prince to Germany, but that it was necessary for him to leave the hotel that very day. It is useless to speak of the brilliant compensations that Rudolph offered to the Slasher: the money that was designed for him—the deed for the farm in Algiers—anything more that he wished; all was at his disposal. The Slasher, cut to the heart, refused all; and, for the first time in his life, perhaps, this man shed tears. It had needed all the persuasion of Rudolph to induce him to accept his previous gifts. The next day the prince sent for La Louve and Martial; and, without informing them that Fleur-de-Marie was his daughter, he asked them what he could do for them; all their wishes should be accomplished. Perceiving their hesitation, and remembering what Fleur-de-Marie had told him about the slightly uncivilized tastes of La Louve and her husband, he offered them either a considerable amount of money, or the half of this amount, and lands in the vicinity of the farm which he had bought for the Slasher. Both of them rugged, energetic, both endowed with good natural impulses, sympathized the better with each other, since they each had reasons to seek solitude—the one for her past life, the other for the crimes of his family. He was not deceived; Martial and La Louve accepted his offer with transport; then, having, through the intervention of Murphy, made the acquaintance of the Slasher, they mutually congratulated each other on the agreeable prospects before them in Algiers. Notwithstanding the deep sadness into which he was plunged; or, rather, in consequence of this sadness the Slasher, affected by the cordial advances of Martial and his wife, responded to them with warmth. In a short time a sincere friendship united the future colonists; persons of their temperament form very sudden attachments. La Louve and Martial, being unable, in spite of their kind attentions, to divert the melancholy of their new friend discontinued their efforts, trusting that the voyage, and the active employment of their future life, would change his thoughts; for, once in Algiers they would be obliged to turn their attention to the cultivation of the lands which had been bestowed upon them. These facts established, it will be understood that, informed of the painful interview that Martial was obliged to undergo in obedience to the last wishes of his mother, the Slasher had wished to accompany his new friend to the gate of Bicetre, where he awaited him in the coach which had brought them, and which took them back to Paris, after Martial, deeply agitated, had left the dungeon, where the terrible preparations for the execution of mother and sister were being made. The physiognomy of the Slasher was completely altered; the expression of boldness and of happiness which ordinarily characterized his manly face was replaced with sorrowful dejection: his voice, also had lost somewhat of its roughness. Grief, until now a stranger to him, had broken, prostrated his energetic nature. He looked at Martial with compassion.
"Cheer up," said the Slasher to him "you have done all that a brave fellow could do—it is all over, think of your wife, of those children whom you have prevented from following the bad example of their parents; and then, besides, this evening we shall have quitted Paris, never to return; and you will never again hear of that which afflicts you."
"It is a11 the same, do you see, Slasher. After all, it is my mother and my sister."
"But what would you—this has happened; and it's no use crying over spilled milk," said the Slasher, suppressing a sigh.
After a moment's silence, Martial said to him, cordially, "I, also, ought to console you, my poor fellow—always this melancholy."
"Always, Martial."
"Well, my wife and I confidently hope that, once away from Paris, it will be dissipated."