The Twin Hells | Page 9

had the chicken-pox?"
"Yes, sir."
"Have you ever had the thresh?"
Well, I didn't know what was meant by the thresh. I knew that I had
been "thrashed" a great many times, and inferred from that fact that I
must have had the disease at some time or other in my youth, so I
answered,
"Yes, sir."
"Have you ever had the itch?"
"What kind?" said I. "The old fashioned seven year kind? Y-e-s, sir, I
have had it."
He then continued asking me questions, and wanted to know if I ever

had a great many diseases, the names of which I had never heard before.
Since I catch almost everything that comes along, I supposed, of course,
that at some period during my childhood, youth or early manhood I had
suffered from all those physical ills, so I always answered,
"Yes, sir." He wound up by inquiring if I ever had a stroke of the horse
glanders. I knew what was meant by that disease, and replied in the
negative.
He then looked at me over the top of his spectacles, and, in a rather
doubting manner, said, "and you really have had all these diseases? By
the way," he continued, "are you alive at the present moment after all
that you have suffered?" Mr. Mooney is an Irishman. He was having a
little cold-blooded sport at my expense. Whenever you meet an
Irishman you will always strike a budget of fun.
His next question was, "Are you a sound man?"
My reply was to the effect that I was, physically, mentally and morally.
So he wrote down in his book opposite my name "physically and
mentally a sound man." He said he would take my word for being
sound morally, but that he would not put that down on the books for the
present, for fear there might be a mistake somewhere. Before
discharging me, he calmly stated that I would make a good coal miner.
All the prisoners undergo this medical cross-examination.
After I had run the doctor's gauntlet, I was conducted from the south
wing of the cell-house to the north wing. Here I met for the first time
Mr. Elliott, who has charge of this building during the daytime. It is a
part of this highly efficient officer's duty to cross-examine the prisoners
as to where they have lived and what they have been doing. His
examinations are very rigid. He is a bright man, a good judge of human
nature, and can tell a criminal at sight. He would make an able criminal
lawyer. He is the prison detective. By means of these examinations he
often obtains clues that lead to the detection of the perpetrators of crime.
I have been told by good authority that on account of information
obtained by this official, two murderers were discovered in the Kansas
penitentiary, and, after their terms had expired, they were immediately

arrested, and, on requisition, taken back to the Eastern States, where the
crimes had been committed, and there tried, convicted and punished
according to the laws of those States. After I had been asked all manner
of questions by this official, he very kindly informed me that I came to
the penitentiary with a bad record. He further stated that I was looked
upon as one of the worst criminals in the State of Kansas. This
information was rather a set-back to me, as I had no idea that I was in
possession of any such record as that. I begged of him to wait a little
while before he made up his mind conclusively as to my character, for
there might be such a thing as his being mistaken. There is no man that
is rendering more effective service to the State of Kansas in the way of
bringing criminals to justice than Mr. Elliott. He has been an officer of
the prison for nearly nine years. As an honest officer he is above
reproach. As a disciplinarian he has no superior in the West.
After this examination I was shown to my cell. It was now about two
o'clock in the afternoon of my first day in prison. I remained in the cell
alone during the entire afternoon. Of all the dark hours of my eventful
history, none have been filled with more gloom and sadness than those
of my first day in prison. Note my antecedents--a college graduate, a
county clerk, the president of a bank, and an editor of a daily
newspaper. All my life I had moved in the highest circles of society,
surrounded by the best and purest of both sexes, and now, here I was, in
the deplorable condition of having been hurled from that high social
position, down to the low degraded plane of a convict. As