I dare not credit the testimony of my senses. I cannot yet believe all that I have suffered in that horrible night which has just passed; a night of horrible dreams, a succession of repugnant nightmares, terrific, phantastic, demoniacal, impossible, inconceivable and nevertheless perfectly and completely real. I thought the night would be endless. I fancied myself in the infernal regions, in a hell as the heated phantasy of the poet of maniacal brain never conceived it. The prison is a sort of a room of 50 yards in length by 6 broad and 5 in height, that is to say 1500 cubic yards. Within its walls sleep 800 individuals according to my calculation. The hygienists claim that 12 by 14 cubic yards of air are necessary in a dwelling for each person: in that space we did not even have 2 cubic yards each. All the ventilation consists in an iron grating at the entrance at one extremity and a window at the other end. How could 800 persons stay in that small space? It is a mystery to me; I have seen it and still I cannot explain it, and I am almost willing to admit the penetrability of the bodies. The men lie down in two rows, feet to feet and the head against the wall. Those who arrive first or the strongest lie on the ground, those who follow do as best they can by lying between two bodies cradle-wise. Everybody must perforce sleep sideways. For this reason quarrels and fights are frequent and occasionally they end in wounds and sometimes in death. In this prison there are some revolting W. C.’s. They are cleaned in the morning, but as the night advances they are used constantly and as there is no running water, the fecal matter and the urine run over onto the ground soaking those who sleep near them. Some wretches even sleep seated on those barrels, and bitter fights take place when somebody wants to use them and for that purpose they are forced to disturb the sleepers on top of the barrels. Others prefer to commit nuisance where they happen to be, against the companions who happen to be near them and that occasions new fights. The atmosphere is so fetid that it almost chokes and asphyxiates you. It is so dense that you can almost cut it with a knife. This dungeon is lighted by some electric lamps whose rays can barely penetrate the atmosphere. Eight hundred men habitually dirty, clad in pestilential rags, the respiration of all those lungs, the emanations of all these bodies, the filth of those barrels.... I am horrified at the remembrance of it all and I am wondering that I am still alive.