Page:The Martyrdom of Ferrer.djvu/79

Rh armed men, feverish and reckless with anger, cutting the wires which might have informed them that Spain was not rising. Over the country beyond were thousands of trained troops concentrating on them.

The morning Of July 27 found everybody in a state of perplexity. There was no plan, no leader, no definite aim. The anger of the people was, however, quickly revived, the barricades were manned—and womanned—the guard were engaged in bloody conflict. It was an old tradition of Spain that when you rioted you burned convents. A Catalan popular song commemorated the burning of seven Madrid convents seventy years before because the authorities had provided spiritless beasts for the bull-ring. The Barcelona convents, so sleek and prosperous in a land that largely disdains them, are particularly hated, and before night forty convents and churches were in flames. Eye-witnesses speak with wonder of the curious mingling of reserve and passion. The buildings, hateful to the Catalans for so many reasons, were ruthlessly set aflame, but the ailing and infirm religious were assisted out of danger by the assailants, who had generally given notice of their intention. From conflicting accounts I gather that only two inmates were killed. One was shot, rifle in hand, in the defence of his home. One was asphyxiated with smoke, obstinately refusing to leave. Money and valuables that were discovered were cast deliberately in the flames by the rioters. It was a new form of revolution.

Catholic journals have stated that Ferrer and his friends took "hundreds of innocent lives and violated the bodies of nuns." Of Ferrer's position at the time I speak presently. The rioters unintentionally took, or were responsible for, two lives in the attack on the convents, though some communities naturally met rifle with rifle, and the most sinister rumours were current among the heated populace. It was widely believed, not only that the bombs of 1896, 1907, and 1908, which had strengthened the arm of despotic corruption, were Catholic bombs, but that the religious were even then provoking