Military life in Italy : sketches - Societa italiana di storia militare

THE CHOLERA OF 1867. 411
" Confess your accomplices, assassin ! " shouted the foremost,
digging their nails into his cheeks and throat, and pressing
their knees, and sticks against his stomach. " Confess !
"
And
those behind stretched out their hands to seize him, threw
themselves here and there, in order to
make an opening in the
The luckless
crowd, reach him, and give him a wound also.
man was dripping with blood from his mouth and ears, his
eyes seemed starting out of his head, a rattling
sound was
"
heard in his chest, and he was a horrible sight. Confess !
"
confess !
Suddenly a loud shout came from the other side of
the street ; it was another poisoner whom another band of
these madmen had assaulted and beaten ;
all turned in that
direction ;
the peddler, being free for a moment, threw back
with one vigorous push the two who stood at his side, dashed
into an open door, and closed it behind him. The crowd, perceiving
this, sprang toward the door, and began beating
it
furiously with stones and picks. The peddler had taken
refuge in a small room on the ground-floor, where there was a
woman who had witnessed the whole scene from a window.
At the appearance of the poisoner she thought
doomed ;
she was
courage and the frenzy of despair took possession of
her, she dashed at him like a fury, seized him by the neck,
and began a terrible battle with teeth and nails. Both falling,
they rolled like wild beasts on the floor, holding tightly to
each other, one on top of
the other as the case might be, their
breath and blood mingling ;
the crowd stretched out their
arms through the window gratings, extended their trembling
hands to seize their victim, shouting horrid words as they did
so. The door began to creak and give way, when, just at
that point, a number of voices shouted :
" The soldiers ! the