Page:Statement of the attempted rescue of General Lafayette from Olmutz.djvu/29

 through a covered way. During these examinations the effort was to make him confess some crime, or acknowledge some plot, and the crossquestioning, to try and confuse him was evident, and annoying. They signified they could compel him to speak the truth, which meant, they could use torture to extort it. His indignation and disgust at such a one-sided trial was openly expressed, and he urged them to bring witnesses—to shew him his accomplices, and to tell him of what he was accused. Always answering his judges with the same assertion, I have told you the whole truth, and never could be made to vary in his account. His interpreter, Professor Passi, he was aware, often softened his expressions of indignation at his treatment.

On one occasion after some weeks of these wearisome and useless examinations, while waiting in an anti-room for his trial to begin, Mr. Huger spoke to Professor Passi in French, of the harshness and injustice with which he was treated—thrown in a dungeon, and chained like a criminal; deprived of his clothes and property, and harassed by examinations where his word was disbelieved, and no witnesses or accusers brought to confront him, and he spoke in earnest and irritated disapproval of the course pursued by the Court. He was listened to by