"Mad!"

Maoriland Worker, Volume 2, Issue 27, 8 September 1911, Page 16

"Mad!"

Yes. I'm mad. Quite mad. Raving, roaring, ravenously mad. Mad as a Red Indian, or a South Sea cannibal, o,r a trapped rat, or a free tiger, or a hungry wolf —or a Curse you, don't look at mc like that. But —no ; no, don't go away. I want to tell you. I want you to know. Yes, I killed them. They wore mine. What did it nrattar to*"anyone?_ I killed them. I kill them every night. I go through it all again and again, here, on this floor, in this cursed padded cell. Every night. They smile at mc now, because they know that I saved them.

They were sweet children, all of them. Four dear bright-faced, happy little angel-eyed darlings. Until I fell out of work. Until your class — damn j r ou —hounded mc down. No, no, I forgot. I'll not shout again. Listen. I got the "sack." I'd been there twenty years, and then they put mc off. .Twenty years. I knew no other work and could get no>ne. My children got thin, and pale, and miserable, and ill. Once bright-eyed, rosy-cheeked happy little .scamps became wan, miserable, whining skeletons.

My dear wife- worked herself to a sort of ragged ghost. Ha! ha! she did look a freak. Excuse my laughter, but I killed her too, bless her. Yes, I. saved her a.s well. She comes and kisses mc every night when I'm curled up in the corner, and we talk, she and I, about the old days. The happy days. The d.ays before I got the sack. Oh, the splendid times we had. The pleasant home-coming from work, the joyous tea-time with my merry, hearty, happy children round the table. How she used to tell mc of all their dear little funny sayings and doings during the day. Then the game of baiting the bear after tea-, with myself as the bear. The romping, and laughter, aaid fun, and noise. And then the bedtime trip upstairs, one on each arm, and one on my back.

I know about them, though. I remember them. Oh! yes. I know of them, and I want you to know of them. It was your class who did it. You are smug visitors to this place now pom© to see that we poor creatures are well done by. Well, near some wisdom from the lips of "a madman. , Why don't you see that we are well done by before we get here, and then there'd be fewer patients to visit. Damn you, you are too intent upon No, no. I forgot. I'll not rave again. Let mc tell you all, now I have started. When I lost my job I lost everything. Work, food, fire, light, love, joy, smiles, comfort, everything that was good to hare. My furniture went, clothes, my dear Avife's rings. Her wedding ring. Her wedding ring. All went. When I came home from failure to get woxk my children did not run to meet mc with merry shouts of laughter. They came whining for bread. Bread. Only bread. And I had none. These children who had always had plenty, wanted bread. When I rushed from the house and took some from a baker's shop, they fell on ajxd devoured it like wolves.

You locked mc up for taking the bread, you remember, and when Ji came out one of my little ones was dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. Yon had put him under the ground, and I— his father: —had not seen him. Theneighbours came in to quiet my ravings, but they s-oon went out again. Ha! ha! They didn't like my looks..

Later, I saw that this little one was better off. He was not being starved to death., slowly murdered. "He was better off." The kind neighbours first "told, mc this to calm my violence. And the kind neighbours were right, lie was better off. The. others should be better off too.

All night long I sat beside them and kissed their cold, clammy faces. I fondled them and nursed them, and sang to them. There they are- down there in a row. Look, curse you, look. You made mc do it. Look. Look. On that old sack with another old sack over them. That's their bed—has been fc-r months. Look at them all in a row. All dead. All gone somewhere better tha.n this. I did it. I did it for love of them. I've told you all now. If I could reach yon I'd sink my hands into .you and tear out your hearts to show you their blackness. You and all .your class. Curse you. Damn you. You have

Tho visitors did not wait to hear any more. —Wilfrid Moore in "John Bull."

Miss Blanche Scott, of Rochester, N.Y., who is one of the first women to fly a.n aeroplane on Long Island, sustained an average height of about 40 feet, and after making three straightaway nights, made three good turns. A puffy wind then appeared, preventing further flying.