Page:Jean Jaurès socialist and humanitarian 1917.djvu/76

Dreyfus change their ground, and remarks particularly how, in July, 1898, when Cavaignac, the War Minister, again speaks in the Chamber on this subject, he no longer dares even to mention the bordereau, but reads the three secret documents on which Dreyfus had really been convicted. Two of these documents merely referred to someone called D., and Jaurès had no difficulty in showing that it was quite impossible to say that this referred to Dreyfus; there was no evidence of any kind that it did. Then there was a third document in which the name of Dreyfus occurs in full, but which, as M. Cavaignac owned, had not fallen into their hands till two years after the trial. It was not difficult for Jaurès to prove that this last had been a forgery. He declared openly that it was so: "In October 1898 … Esterhazy, Paty du Clam and the Staff knew that Colonel Picquart had gathered together against Esterhazy the most crushing charges. They knew that the bordereau was Esterhazy's, that the secret documents contained nothing serious against Dreyfus, that evidence which would probably establish the innocence of the unhappy condemned man was about to appear and that the Staff would be compromised … Esterhazy and his accomplices on the Staff decided to fabricate a false letter which should prove at last the culpability of Dreyfus." Jaurès brought internal evidence against them to prove this