Page:The Jail, Experiences in 1916.pdf/170

 lation deviated often, in places Frank had the precise opposite of what I had written in my verses.

This was my first crime—a poem "In memory of November 5th, 1905." When I had completed the translation. I explained how the poem had arisen. At the time when negotiations were proceeding to codify the universal suffrage law, there had been big workmen's demonstrations in Vienna and Prague. Thousands and thousands of people had marched through the streets, nowhere had there been any disturbances, the police were superfluous, the proletariat had displayed their disciplined strength and with it the justice of their demand. They had not threatened, they had kept silent, but it was a silence which was eloquent. And the deductions I had drawn from this as regards the success of my nation's desires, I had expressed in that poem.

A few more questions, then the report. Frank paraphrased my remarks and deductions very nicely; if I wanted to supplement anything, he paraphrased everything readily in accordance with my wishes.

Can there really be a human being inside this letter of the law? I thought to myself in astonishment.

We proceeded to the second crime, the poem "Hospital Humanitarianism". Again the translation first, then the commentary. As the somewhat trivial treatment of the verses attests, it is the monologue of a poor wretch who has just been discharged from a hospital, I heard the contents in a tram, where that man was formulating his view of the world. As long as you are well, nobody troubles about you, whether you are starving, freezing—it's all the same. They want taxes from you, they take you into the army, give this and they care nothing else about you. But if you fall ill, what a fuss! You have a bed, attendance, plenty of food, suddenly you are