McCLURE'S, ARCHER AND FERRER 



McCLURE'S MAGAZINE for November has an arti- 

 cle entitled "The Life and Death of Ferrer," writ- 

 ten by the English correspondent, William Archer, 

 who, it is said, went to Spain for the particular purpose of 

 ascertaining the facts concerning Ferrer. To judge from 

 the first installment of his work Mr. Archer might per- 

 haps have saved himself the trouble: for, no matter what 

 he gathered, he has written down only what was contained 

 in McCabe's "Martyrdom of Ferrer," the anonymous "Un 

 Martyr des Pretres," and other books of Hke import. There 

 seems to have been no investigation on his part of any of 

 the Spanish officials, merchants, bankers, men of substance, 

 persons interested in preserving the good name and char- 

 acter of Barcelona. All the investigation and all the re- 

 sults shown in the installment of the November number seem 

 to have been wholly directed towards Ferrer's late com- 

 rades and sympathizers alone; and even the majority of 

 such results, as stated, are copied out of the above-named 

 books. Spanish official records, statistics, memoranda, and the 

 like were not difficult to get at in Barcelona, yet they never 

 seem to have been consulted, or even as much as mentioned. 

 To judge from Mr. Archer's report it would seem that there 

 was only a slight "unpleasantness" ; and yet Ferrer alone was 

 executed for its occurrence. Certainly that is the impression 

 he has studiously endeavored to create. 



Yet, even with that, he has to admit that Ferrer, after all, 

 was not the beau-ideal of a teacher of children, a moulder of 

 infancy, either in morals or rectitude, as understood among 

 us. For instance, he admits that Ferrer had relations with 

 at least two women other than the particular one who was 

 the direct cause of the outburst of jealousy against him by 



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