Page:The "Trial" of Ferrer - A Clerical Judicial Murder (IA 2916970.0001.001.umich.edu).pdf/40

 we must study them. They are too long to be reproduced here; they are merely long tirades of the usual Anarchistic type. But, on studying them a little carefully, the following points come out of themselves: In the first place, they are written by a man who calls himself a "companion of misery and degradation;" it would have been absurd for Ferrer, a rich man, to speak of himself in those terms. They were written in the neighborhood of 1900, as is clearly shown by allusions to political events of that period. The revolutionary program which they propose does not at all correspond to the one executed by the insurgents of 1909. They were written for general propaganda, and not for the preparation and organization of a revolt upon a fixed date. The whole context, but especially two passages, suggests very strongly that they were products of an agent provocateur of the police, who as usual, show their ear-marks by some stupid blunder.

For instance, the second circular ends with this sentence: "Follows the recipe for the preparation of plancastite." (The recipe was not found with the circulars.) Now panclastite is an explosive, the preparation of which is extremely delicate, highly dangerous and very costly; it can be successfully tried only by chemical experts in a laboratory. It is unlikely that anyone should seriously furnish the recipe to poor and uneducated workingmen. It is probable that the sentence above quoted was added merely to give an appearance of genuineness to the document, by naming an explosive the frightful strength of which had been spoken of in all the newspapers at the time of its discovery in 1882. In another passage of the circular it says: "Do not pay any heed to those who will tell you that this is a work of the government, of the police or of the enemies of the proletariat." The author of this circu-