FRANCE. 



301 



studied all the evidence conscientiously, and Gen. 

 Roget and Major Cuignet, who had made an 

 independent examination, were the most com- 

 pletely convinced as well as the most thoroughly 

 versed in the case against Dreyfus. M. Cavai- 

 gnac was ready to believe that Dreyfus had sent 

 the information even if Esterhazy had written 

 the bordereau or sworn that he wrote it, because 

 Dreyfus alone could have gathered these facts 

 in the different bureaus with which he was con- 

 nected. All the officers who had been in the 

 Ministry of War had the same conviction of the 

 guilt of the accused, based on technical grounds 

 and on knowledge of his character and habits. 

 Of new evidence not much of importance was 

 brought forward. A man deposed that he had 

 seen a newspaper in the palace at Potsdam with 

 a marginal note that Dreyfus was arrested writ- 

 ten by Emperor Wilhelm; a groom that he had 

 driven Dreyfus in company with German officers 

 to the German manoeuvres. German officers had 

 spoken his name in a Berlin restaurant. An Aus- 

 trian adventurer was introduced toward the close 

 of the trial, who said that some diplomatic 

 agents had spoken at length of his treason in a- 

 Swiss summer resort. An Italian lady had of- 

 fered to prove the guilt of Dreyfus. This gave 

 the counsel of Dreyfus, who saw that the case 

 was going against them, an opportunity to ask, 

 since the prosecution had invoked the testimony 

 of a foreigner, that Col. Von Schwarzkoppen and 

 Col. Panizzardi be invited to testify, permission 

 having been requested of the German Emperor 

 and the King of Italy; but the court refused to 

 accept their evidence if it were offered. Col. 

 Du Paty de Clam was very ill, and could not 

 appear. Major Esterhazy refused to come from 

 London, although promised immunity from ar- 

 rest. Gen. Roget declared that he could not 

 have written the bordereau, because he was never 

 employed by the intelligence department; and the 

 denials of the Italian and German attaches 

 seemed to him quibbling and equivocal. An of- 

 ficer proved that Dreyfus had drawn mobiliza- 

 tion maps, and knew the dispositions of the cov- 

 ering troops when they were not known at the 

 time the bordereau was written even to corps 

 commanders. Gen. Mereier introduced a star- 

 tling piece of evidence against the prisoner, con- 

 sisting of a letter from Col. Schneider, the Aus- 

 trian military attache in Paris, stating his 

 conviction that Dreyfus was in relation with the 

 German confidential bureaus in Strasburg and 

 Brussels. Col. Schneider at first denounced this 

 as a forgery, but it appeared that the forgery 

 consisted in putting a date on his memorandum 

 and making it falsely appear as a report. Col. 

 Picquart deposed that a German spy, Richard 

 Cuers, had said that they had but one French 

 officer in their pay, a major, and described Es- 

 terhazy. Henry went with others to Switzer- 

 land to question him further, but would not let 

 him say what he was willing to reveal. It was 

 Col. Henry and his underlings who had blocked 

 all his investigations concerning Esterhazy. It 

 came out subsequently that Henry was in Ester - 

 hazy's debt, and that they had relations with 

 one another extending over many years. M. 

 Bertulus, a magistrate well acquainted with 

 Henry, endeavored to show that the latter was 

 a traitor, recounting an interview in which he 

 betrayed guilt and a fear of arrest. The theory 

 of the defense was that Esterhazy had written 

 the bordereau and communicated with the for- 

 eign agent, but that Henry had supplied the 

 documents and information from the general 

 staff. Handwriting experts maintained that 



Dreyfus did not write the bordereau; some had 

 changed their opinion since 1894, and now at- 

 tributed it to Esterhazy; others retained their 

 original impression. M. Bertillon offered a cryp- 

 tographic theory that Dreyfus had written the 

 bordereau by tracing the words over a keyboard, 

 so that if it were discovered it would appear to 

 be a forgery and himself the victim of a con- 

 spiracy; and that Esterhazy had since the con- 

 viction of Dreyfus been studying to imitate the 

 writing in the bordereau so as to pass for its 

 author. Statements of the Italian minister, Count 

 Tornielli, that Dreyfus was unknown to Ital- 

 ian agents, and of Col. Panizzardi that the Ger- 

 man attache had assured him that he had no 

 relations with Dreyfus, but had been in com- 

 munication with and received documents from 

 Major Esterhazy, were placed in evidence, and 

 an admission of Col. Von Schwarzkoppen that 

 he had sent many telegram cards to Esterhazy, 

 and perhaps the petit bleu of the dossier, were 

 offered in evidence. The military judges gave 

 little attention to the evidence against Ester- 

 hazy, except perhaps as an accomplice of Dreyfus. 

 The confession of Dreyfus, as related by Capt. 

 Lebrun-Renaud and corroborated by statements 

 made before his death by Capt. d'Attel, who had 

 overheard the conversation, influenced their de- 

 cision, but most of all they were impressed by 

 the weight of the technical evidence against 

 Dreyfus and the overwhelming preponderance of 

 professional opinion in the army as to his guilt. 

 His own demeanor during the trial, his failure 

 to rebut much of the damaging evidence, al- 

 though acute enough in seizing upon points that 

 told in his favor and wary in clinging to his pre- 

 concerted line of defense, did not prepossess the 

 judges in his favor. The verdict was given on 

 Sept. 9. He was found guilty by a vote of 5 

 to 2, but a majority of the court found extenu- 

 ating circumstances, and his sentence was there- 

 fore ten years' detention in a fortress. The years 

 already spent in Cayenne reduced the term by 

 half, and the remainder of the sentence was 

 afterward canceled by President Loubet on the 

 ground of the prisoner's precarious state of 

 health. 



The trial of the leaders of the League of Patri- 

 ots, the Anti-Semitic League, and the royalist 

 party for high treason, which was begun before 

 the Senate, sitting as the High Court of Justice, 

 on Sept. 18, brought out evidence of an under- 

 standing between the various revolutionary fac- 

 tions and an organized attempt to stir up street 

 riots and seduce the army, with a view to over- 

 throwing the. Government. Paul Deroulede and 

 Marcel Habert, while aiming avowedly at a ple- 

 biscitary republic, conspired with Orleanists to 

 bring about a coup d'etat, and Jules Guerin. the 

 Anti-Semitic leader, received royalist subven- 

 tions. Dubuc, the head of the Anti-Semitic 

 Youth, organized the revolutionary movement in 

 the provinces. Godefroy, president of the Royal- 

 ist Youth League, and Andre Buffet, the accred- 

 ited representative of the Duke of Orleans, sought 

 to buy the support of labor syndicates and asso- 

 ciations not only in Paris, but all over France, 

 as well as the secret aid of the Anti-Semites. The 

 duke himself directed the conspiracy, furnished 

 funds for the seditious demonstrations that be- 

 came incessant toward the eritl of 1898, and pre- 

 pared to enter France when the propitious mo- 

 ment arrived. The presidential election passed 

 off so quickly that it forestalled the revolutionary 

 movement; but the entry of the President into 

 Paris, the funeral of M. "Faure, and the various 

 stages of the revision trial were made the oc- 



