Your devoted
ALFRED.
A thousand kisses to your dear parents, to all our friends.
* * * * *
_7 February, 1898._
Dear Lucie:
I have just received your dear letters of December, and my heart is
breaking; it is rent by the consciousness of so much unmerited
suffering. I have told you that the thought of you, of the children,
always raises me up, quivering with anguish, with a supreme
determination, from the thought of all that we hold most precious in the
world--our honor, that of our children--to utter this cry of appeal,
that grows more and more thrilling--the cry of a man who asks nothing
but justice for himself and those he loves, and who has the right to ask
it.
For the last three months, in fever and in delirium, suffering martyrdom
night and day for you, for our children, I have addressed appeal on
appeal to the Chief of the State, to the Government, to those who caused
me to be condemned, to the end that I may obtain justice after all my
torment, an end to our terrible martyrdom; and I have not been answered.
To-day I am reiterating my former appeals to the Chief of the State and
to the Government, with still more energy, if that could be; for you
must be no longer subjected to such a martyrdom; our children must not
grow up dishonored; I can no longer agonize in a black hole for an
abominable crime that I did not commit. And now I am waiting; I expect
each day to hear that the light of truth is to shine for us at last.
I embrace you, as I love you, with all the power of my love; also our
dear and adored children.
Your devoted
ALFRED.
A thousand, thousand kisses to your dear parents, to all our family.
* * * * *
_25 February, 1898._
Dear Lucie:
Our thoughts are in harmony; my thought does not leave you for one
single instant day or night; and should I listen only to my heart I
should write to you each moment, every hour.
If you are the echo of my sufferings, I am the echo of yours, of the
sufferings of you all. I doubt that human beings have ever suffered
more. The thought of you, of the children, and my longing always
outstretched toward you, toward them, still always give me the strength
to compress my bursting brain, to restrain my heart.
I have written you numerous letters in these last months; to add
anything to these letters would be superfluous. I have told you all the
appeals I have addressed since November last--appeals in which I ask for
my rehabilitation, for justice for so many innocent victims.
In one of my last letters I told you that I had just addressed a last
appeal to the Government, an appeal more earnest, more energetic than
any that I had made before. So I am waiting, expecting day by day to
learn that this rehabilitation has taken place, that our tortures, as
appalling as they were unmerited, are to end; that the light of justice
shines at last. I wish, therefore, to-day only to embrace you with all
my strength, with all my heart, as I love you; so, also, I embrace our
dear children.
Your devoted
ALFRED.
A thousand, thousand kisses to your dear parents, to all our dear
relations, to all our dear brothers and sisters.
* * * * *
_5 March, 1898._
Dear Lucie:
I have just received your dear letters of January. Your letters are
always wonderfully equal in spirit, in feeling, and in elevation of
soul. I shall not add anything to the long letters I have written to you
during the last three months; the last were perhaps nervous, overflowing
with impatience, with pain, with suffering; but all this is too
appalling, and there have been responsibilities to establish.
I will not go over and over my thoughts indefinitely. After explaining
the details of a situation as tragic as it is undeserved, a situation
that has been so long borne by so many victims, I ask and ask again my
rehabilitation of the Government, and now I am expecting each day to
learn that the light of justice is at last to shine for us.
I embrace you, as I love you, with all the power of my love, as I
embrace also our dear children.
My fondest love to all our friends.