THE SWEATING OVEN.
Down in the depths of those prison mines many a terrible scene took
place at which humanity shuddered. Once huddled under ground and sealed
in with the massive iron bars that crossed that small trap-door, little
care was needed for the safety of the prisoners. So, like wild cattle
hustled into a pound, they were left to their own vicious instincts, and
those often led to riot and revolt. Sometimes the terrible monotony of
this life was broken by a new gang of prisoners, who, shocked and
outraged in every manly feeling by the degradation heaped upon them,
fiercely resisted the rules which levelled them below the common brutes
of the field, and, like wild animals just lassoed on the prairies,
turned fiercely upon their tormentors.
Cases of horrible cruelty often occurred in the prison; Katharine knew
of it only from the fierce noises that echoed through her cell at night,
and by the frightened faces that passed before her during the next day.
It was enough to shock the most hardened human soul, to know that any of
those terrible means of punishment, invented as the curse of our
prisons, was in progress. The very idea was enough to drive the blood
from Katharine's heart. But she was helpless--had not even the power of
protest--all she could do was to turn her pitying eyes on the poor
wretch when his sufferings were over, and thus prove that compassion
existed even in that terrible place. Usually these scenes of punishment
ended in the hospital, then her sweet ministry made itself deeply felt,
and many a hard heart yielded itself to her kindness which the most
bitter correction had failed to reach.
Something of this kind had just transpired in the prison. A new convict
had been sent in from the courts, and his first resistance of the prison
laws had been met with unusual rigor. That night Katharine heard low
groans, but no cries followed the crack of the lash, which fell so
sharply and lasted so long that every nerve in her body quivered and
shrunk with that keen sympathy which made the anguish of a
fellow-creature her own.
She arose in the morning literally sore at heart, wounded with more
tender anxiety than had ever affected her before regarding the man who
had borne those awful lashes so bravely. Her duties for a time lay under
ground, where much of the prison work was done. She went about them with
a heavy heart. The damp, the close atmosphere, and absence of all
sunlight deepened the despondency that had seized upon her. In these
subterraneous vaults is a vast oven, in which the prisoners' bread was
baked, and here her duties for the morning were appointed. A woman stood
before this oven casting wood into the red caverns of fire that glowed
behind the rolling smoke. The woman paused with a huge stick of pitch
pine half lifted to the oven, and balancing it a moment in her hands,
she cast it to the earth, and sitting down upon it began to cry.
Katharine advanced that moment, and touched her on the arm.
"I can't--I can't! Whip me, if you like--put me in with him, but I can't
do it!"
The woman evidently thought it one of the keepers, who had watched her
rebellious movement. Katharine bent over her.
"What is the matter, Jones? It is only I. Can I help you?"
The woman looked up, relieved by the voice.
"No," she said, heavily. "It is the old story. You heard the lash last
night--it kept us all awake. It is a new prisoner they are breaking in;
a handsome, fine fellow; but he stood them out like a lion, and now--"
The woman paused and looked toward the oven with a sort of terror in her
eyes.
"And now--oh! Jane, is he dead?" whispered Katharine. "Did they kill
him?"
The woman pointed to a narrow door built close to the mouth of the oven,
and whispered--
"He is in there!"
Katharine recoiled.
"In there, and that fire raging so; God have mercy upon us! it is
death!"
"No, not always; not often, I think," answered the woman; "but I never
did this work before. The sweat oven has not been used in my time till
now. It's awful!"
A smothered moan, which rose above the roar and crackle of the fire,
curdled the very blood in Katharine's veins.
"What is it? What is the horrible thing they are doing?" she cried,
wildly. "What is that place?"
"You see the door--how narrow it is--a poor creature can hardly push
through. Inside, it is just as narrow; stone walls pressing close up
against the wretch, heated from the oven hot as life can bear."
"Oh, my God, my God, is this thing true?" cried Katharine, cowering
down, and covering her face with both hands.
"I wont heap on the wood," cried the woman, bitterly. "They haven't the
power to make me."
"Hush, hush; some one is coming."
It was a keeper to whom the terrible punishment had been entrusted.
Katharine rose slowly to her feet and stood before him, her hands
clasped, and the pale anguish of her face revealed by the fire light,
which illuminated the darkness all around them.
"What are you women talking about? Go to your work, Katharine Allen."
She could not speak, but fell upon her knees, beseeching him with those
wild eyes.
"What is all this about?" said the man, softening his voice.
"She wants you to let that poor man out--that's it," answered the woman,
resting both elbows on her knees, and looking up from her seat on the
wood. "She knows it aint human to treat any of God's creatures in this
way, and wants to tell you so, only them groans has frightened the soul
out of her body."
The man looked down at the young creature kneeling at his feet, and a
shade of sympathy swept over his face.
"Get up," he said, almost kindly. "I have just come to see about him.
This sort of thing don't gibe with my feelings more than it does with
yours, but the fellow was obstinate as a mule--wanted a little of the
proud blood sweated out of him, and I reckon he's got enough of it by
this time."
"Oh, be quick, be quick, or he may die!" cried Katharine, gaining her
voice. "How faint the moans are! Open the door! open the door!--hear how
his poor hands beat against it!"
"Well, go away--this is no place for you. Run to the well, and have some
water dipped up ready. They always make a dive for that first."
Katharine sprang to her feet, and darting across the space illuminated
by the oven, made her way toward the well, which gushed out pure and
crystalline in the depths of the mine, the only untainted thing in those
subterranean regions. An iron lamp swung in the walls of the cavern near
this outgush of pure water, which turned all the wavelets it touched to
gold.
This was the spot to which the prisoners came when athirst, like cattle
to a spring; and to this place, as the keeper truly said, the man who
had suffered from the flames of that hot oven would surely come.
Katharine took an iron dipper, which was chained to the stones of the
well, and filling it with water, held it till the weight bore down her
hand, then she filled it once more from the centre of the well, and
again held it ready. This time she had not long to wait, for she saw a
human figure coming through the darkness with desperate effort, but slow
progress--making futile attempts at speed, and giving broken leaps that
brought him reeling and staggering every instant against the sides of
the cavern.
Katharine poured out the water, and dipped it up afresh, as if that
little effort could make it cooler. She would have gone forward to meet
the man, but the chain would not permit it, and thus she stood waiting
till he came up. He saw the vessel in her hand, dripping over with a
rain of cool drops, and seizing upon it before she could look up,
drained it off in wild, greedy haste.
"More! more!" he cried, dropping the dipper, and sweeping the
perspiration from his face. "More! more!"
Katharine plunged the dipper into the well again. He would have snatched
it from her but she lifted it to his lips. In this position the
lamp-light fell upon her face. She dropped the iron vessel from between
her two hands, as he fell forward with his face to the earth. She did
not breathe--for her life she could not have uttered a sound--but
dropping on her knees beside the prostrate man, she lifted his head from
the earth. The light lay full upon his face. His eyes looked piteously
into hers. She drew him up to her bosom; with the folds of her prison
dress she wiped the rain of perspiration from his forehead and left
tender kisses in its place; soft words came to her lips, tears swelled
into her eyes; she had but one thought--holy thanksgiving to Heaven.
Directly the keeper came up, wondering that his victim should remain so
long at the well.
"Halloo!" he said, "what is this? I thought you were half dead, my fine
fellow!"
Katharine looked up; her face was radiant, and yet a tender pity beamed
there.
"Hush!" she said; "he is my husband."
The keeper gave a prolonged whistle that echoed mournfully through the
caverns, but Katharine repeated:
"Yes, it is my husband."
Thrasher did not speak, but she felt him trembling in her arms; his head
rested more heavily on her bosom; he scarcely breathed.
The keeper felt some gleams of sympathy swelling in his bosom. With him
Katharine had always been a favorite. He took compassion on her now.
"Poor fellow! he has had a tough job of it," he said; "weak as a
kitten--why, see how he trembles; I'll just go to the warden and have
him sent up to the hospital, where you can tend him till he picks up
again."
Katharine smiled gratefully, and they were left alone, the woman and her
husband. She bent down and kissed him.
"Nelson, my husband, speak one word--say that you know me."
He whispered hoarsely, "Yes, Katharine, I know you."
"And love me yet?"
The proud man was shorn of his strength, and burst into tears. When the
keeper returned, her hand was locked in that of her husband. He was
talking to her in a feeble voice, broken with grief; telling her things
which made even that dark place still darker--of his unfaithfulness and
its stern retribution. His heart was broken up, he kept nothing back.
His crimes were great, but the record was given in few words, saddening
the poor wife, who had been so happy a moment before, in spite of her
bonds. She heard him through, wondering that so much of joy should lie
underneath these facts, and whispering to herself: "He will be here
seven years, and I with him. Oh, how much can be done in seven years!"
The keeper had compassion on them; he led Thrasher away to that portion
of the prison devoted to the sick, and there the heaven of Katharine's
convict life grew bright, for she saw the path of her duty clear, and
knew, in her soul, that a holy work lay in her hands, a work of comfort
and regeneration, which should lead her husband into the sunlight again.
She forgave him from the depths of her own pure heart; she forgave him
all the wrong he had done, and all the hopes he had destroyed. Her care,
her gentleness, and the holy faith that pervaded her words and acts, had
its effect on this iron-hearted man. I cannot describe that which is
beyond words, or tell how this gentle martyr reached the stern man's
heart; but it softened day by day under her patient tending, and when he
went back to the dreary duties of those prison mines, it was with a
changed aspect. She had taught him, not only how beautiful a thing human
love is, but through that most sacred of earthly feelings, led him to
the holy source of all love, all honor, all the glory of life.
And so, as the years of their imprisonment wore on, these two people
bore their fate with something better than mere resignation. They were
content to work out the duties before them, feeling it recompense enough
if they could smile on each other in passing down to their places of
rest, or exchange a word of comfort and encouragement now and then by
the well, where they had first met.
Do not pity these people overmuch; where true love and faith exists,
there is little need of compassion. Out of the depths of his penitence
sprang up that perfect love which makes a heaven of any place. As for
Katharine, was not her prison life made bright and beautiful. What was
seven years of toil, hunger, and thirst to her if it redeemed the
husband who had been lost?