For months and months the situation in South Africa took all my heart
and mind.

In the first days of January, 1896, came the Jameson Raid, and I sailed
for South Africa. I had work to do for _The Saturday Review_, absorbing
work by day and night. In the summer I was back in England, but the task
of defending the Boer farmers grew more and more arduous, and I only
heard that Oscar was going on as well as could be expected.

Some time later, after he had been transferred to Reading Gaol, bad news
leaked out, news that he was breaking up, was being punished,
persecuted. His friends came to me, asking: could anything be done? As
usual my only hope was in the supreme authority. Sir Evelyn Ruggles
Brise was the head of the Prison Commission; after the Home Secretary,
the most powerful person, the permanent official behind the
Parliamentary figure-head; the man who knew and acted behind the man who
talked. I sat down and wrote to him for an interview: by return came a
courteous note giving me an appointment.

I told him what I had heard about Oscar, that his health was breaking
down and his reason going, pointed out how monstrous it was to turn
prison into a torture-chamber. To my utter astonishment he agreed with
me, admitted, even, that an exceptional man ought to have exceptional
treatment; showed not a trace of pedantry; good brains, good heart. He
went so far as to say that Oscar Wilde should be treated with all
possible consideration, that certain prison rules which pressed very
hardly upon him should be interpreted as mildly as possible. He admitted
that the punishment was much more severe to him than it would be to an
ordinary criminal, and had nothing but admiration for his brilliant
gifts.