They were not to be bothered with such trivial and frequent
occurrences.

There was a young Dutch boy, about eighteen years of age, who had fits
most frequently of all. He usually threw one every day. It was for
that reason that we kept him on the ground floor farther down in the
row of cells in which we lodged. After he had had a few fits in the
prison-yard, the guards refused to be bothered with him any more, and
so he remained locked up in his cell all day with a Cockney cell-mate,
to keep him company. Not that the Cockney was of any use. Whenever the
Dutch boy had a fit, the Cockney became paralyzed with terror.

The Dutch boy could not speak a word of English. He was a farmer's
boy, serving ninety days as punishment for having got into a scrap
with some one. He prefaced his fits with howling. He howled like a
wolf. Also, he took his fits standing up, which was very inconvenient
for him, for his fits always culminated in a headlong pitch to the
floor. Whenever I heard the long wolf-howl rising, I used to grab a
broom and run to his cell. Now the trusties were not allowed keys to
the cells, so I could not get in to him. He would stand up in the
middle of his narrow cell, shivering convulsively, his eyes rolled
backward till only the whites were visible, and howling like a lost
soul. Try as I would, I could never get the Cockney to lend him a
hand. While he stood and howled, the Cockney crouched and trembled in
the upper bunk, his terror-stricken gaze fixed on that awful figure,
with eyes rolled back, that howled and howled. It was hard on him,
too, the poor devil of a Cockney. His own reason was not any too
firmly seated, and the wonder is that he did not go mad.

All that I could do was my best with the broom. I would thrust it
through the bars, train it on Dutchy's chest, and wait. As the crisis
approached he would begin swaying back and forth. I followed this
swaying with the broom, for there was no telling when he would take
that dreadful forward pitch. But when he did, I was there with the
broom, catching him and easing him down. Contrive as I would, he never
came down quite gently, and his face was usually bruised by the stone
floor. Once down and writhing in convulsions, I'd throw a bucket of
water over him. I don't know whether cold water was the right thing or
not, but it was the custom in the Erie County Pen. Nothing more than
that was ever done for him. He would lie there, wet, for an hour or
so, and th