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PRISON DISCIPLINE. Authority in every age and in every country has claimed to impose penalties on all who offend against it. Either coercion or protection has been the moving principle: the master extorted submission, or society, through its rulers, defended itself against evil doers. The most common punishments in early times were naturally those most easily inflicted. Offenders paid in their persons: they were put to death with every variety of the capital sentence, were branded, mutilated, or sold as slaves. They were fined also, were degraded, or forfeited civil rights, or yet again were simply banished from their homes. Enforced detention, incarceration within four walls, was another method of coercion which grew and gained favonr under the feudal system. The lord temporal or spiritual or corporate body could thus hold the vassal safe until he yielded fealty or submitted to extortion. A dungeon told no tales, and served conveniently to bury the victims of mediaeval oppression. The unrestrained and unjustifiable exercise of the power to imprison lingered long in lands where personal liberty was unknown; nor did arbitrary imprisonment terminate with the destruction of the Bastille. In England, however, free-dom from illegal arrest, the dearest of the Briton’s pri-vileges, was resolutely fought for and early achieved. The Great Charters conceded it; and, although often in danger, it was confirmed finally and beyond all question by the Habeas Corpus Act passed in the reign of Charles II. But the theory was better than the practice: numbers always languished in jail, the victims of needlessly severe or misinterpreted laws, who nowadays would have been at large. Through long years of trouble and dis-quiet, when the country was torn with religious and political dissensions, the prisons were always full. Intoler-ance appealed to the strong arm, and the jail was the antechamber of the scaffold or stake. When party warfare ran high, when kings struggled for larger powers or their ministers and myrmidons ruled with a high hand, incar-ceration was the easy recompense for all on the losing side. The commercial laws of a nation wedded to trade kept a large contingent always in jail. The debtor was at the mercy of his creditor, who could command the best efforts of the law to assist him in recovering his own again. Irregu-larity in the administration of justice contributed largely to fill the prisons. Jail deliveries were frequently de-layed indefinitely; while, even when tardy trial ended in an acquittal, release was not always accorded, and innocent men, unable to meet extortionate demands in fees, were carried back to prison. This was one reason why jails were full; yet another was the laxity or entire absence of discipline which suffered the families of accused persons to share their confinement. Under such conditions, more or less universal, the state of prisons, not in England alone, but throughout the then civilized world, was deplorable in the extreme. Yet the terrors of incarceration were long but vaguely understood. Glimpses of light sometimes penetrated the dark recesses of the prison house, as when the atrocities perpetrated by the keepers of the chief debtors’ prisons in London were made the subject of parliamentary inquiry. This was in 1730, forty-three years before the revelations of Howard. But in the interval voices were occasionally raised in protest, and there was a general sense of uneasiness throughout the country to which the great philanthropist gave point and expression. Howard began his journeys of inspection in 1773 ; in the following year he was examined by the House of Commons, and received the thanks of the House for his arduous and self-sacrificing labours for the mitigation of suffering in jails. What Howard found is sufficiently well known. The prisons of the kingdom were a disgrace to humanity: they were for the most part poisonous pestiferous dens, densely over crowded, dark, foully dirty, not only ill-ventilated, but deprived altogether of fresh air. The wretched inmates were thrown into subterranean dungeons, into wet and noisome caverns and hideous holes to rot and fester, a prey to fell disease bred and propagated in the prison house, and de-prived of the commonest necessaries of life. For food they were dependent upon the caprice of their jailers or the charity of the benevolent; water was denied them except in the scantiest proportions; they were half naked or in rags; their only bedding was putrid straw reeking with exhalations and accumulated filth. Every one in durance, whether tried or untried, was heavily ironed; women did not escape the infliction. All alike were subject to the rapacity of their jailers and the extortions of their fellows. Jail fees were levied ruthlessly,—"garnish" also, the tax or contribution paid by each individual to a common fund to be spent by the whole body, generally in drink. Drunkenness was universal and quite unchecked; gambling of all kinds was practised; vice and obscenity were everywhere in the ascendant. Idleness, drunkenness, vicious intercourse, sickness, starvation, squalor, cruelty, chains, awful oppression, and everywhere culpable neglect—in these words may be summed up the state of the jails at the time of Howard’s visitation.

It must be borne in mind that all this time the prisons were primarily places of detention, not of punishment. The bulk of those committed to their safe keeping were accused persons awaiting trial in due process of law, or debtors; and of these again by far the most numerous class were the impecunious and the unfortunate, whom a mistaken system locked up and deprived of all means of paying their liabilities. Now and again an offender was sentenced to be imprisoned in default of payment of fine, or to pass the intervals between certain periods of dis-graceful exposure on the pillory. Imprisonment had as yet no regular place in the code of penalties, and the jail was only the temporary lodging of culprits duly tried and sentenced according to law. The punishment most in favour in these ruthless times was death. The statute book bristled with capital felonies, and the gallows was in perpetual requisition. These were days when the pick--pocket was hanged; so was the sheep-stealer, and the forger of one-pound notes. Well might Sir Samuel Romilly, to whose strenuous exertions the amelioration of the penal code is in a great measure due, declare that the laws of England were written in blood. But even then there was another and a less sanguinary penalty. The deportation of criminals beyond seas grew naturally out of the laws which prescribed banishment for certain offences. The Vagrancy Act of Elizabeth’s reign contained in it the germ of transportation, by empowering justices in quarter sessions to banish offenders and order them to be conveyed into such parts beyond the seas as should be assigned by Her Majesty’s privy council. Full effect was given to this statute in the next reign, as is proved by a letter of James I., dated 1619, in which the king directs "a hundred dissolute persons" to be sent to Virginia. An-other Act of similar tenor was passed in the reign of Charles II., in which the term "transportation" appears to have been first used. A further and more systematic development of the system of transportation took place in 1718, when an Act was passed by which offenders who had escaped the death penalty were handed over to contractors, who engaged to transport them to the American colonies. These contractors were vested with a property in the labour of the convicts for a certain term, generally from seven to fourteen years, and this right they fre-quently sold. Labour in those early days was scarce in the new settlements; and before the general adoption of negro slavery there was a keen competition for felon hands. The demand was indeed so great that it produced illegal methods of supply. An organized system of kid-napping prevailed along the British coasts; young lads were seized and sold into what was practically white slavery in the American plantations. These malpractices were checked, but the legitimate traffic in convict labour continued until it was ended peremptorily by the revolt of the American colonies and the achievement of their inde-pendence. In 1776 the British legislature, making a virtue of necessity, discovered that transportation to His Majesty’s colonies (which in the same year had declared their independence) was bound to be attended by various inconveniences, particularly by depriving the king-dom of many subjects whose labour might be useful to the community; and an Act was accordingly passed which provided that convicts sentenced to transportation might be employed at hard labour at home. At the same time the consideration of some scheme for their disposal was entrusted to three eminent public men—Sir William Blackstone, Mr Eden (afterwards Lord Auckland), and John Howard. The result of their labours was an Act for the establishment of penitentiary houses, dated 1778. This Act is of peculiar importance. It contains the first public enunciation of a general principle of penal treat-ment, and shows that even at that early date the system since nearly universally adopted was fully understood. The object in view was thus stated. It was hoped, by sobriety, cleanliness, and medical assistance, by a regular series of labour, by solitary confinement during the inter-vals of work, and by due religious instruction, to preserve and amend the health of the unhappy offenders, to inure them to habits of industry, to guard them from pernicious company, to accustom them to serious reflexion, and to teach them both the principles and practice of every Christian and moral duty. The experience of a century has added nothing to these the true principles of penal discipline; they form the basis of every species of prison system carried out since the passing of the Act 19 Geo. III. c. 74 in 1779.

The first step towards giving effect to this Act was the appointment of a commission of three "supervisors" to select and acquire a site for the first penitentiary house. Howard was one, and no doubt the most influential, of these; but he could not agree with his colleagues as to the most suitable situation. One was for Islington, another for Limehouse, while Howard insisted upon some site which was healthy, well supplied with water, and in such a convenient spot that it could be readily visited and in-spected. It is interesting to observe that the great phil-anthropist anticipated modern English practice in his preparation of the plans for the construction of the prison. He was strongly of opinion that the penitentiary should be built by convict labour, just as in recent years the new prison has been erected at Wormwood Scrubs, and large blocks added to the prisons of Chatham, Portsmouth, and Dartmoor. Howard, however, withdrew from the commission, and new supervisors were appointed, who were on the eve of commencing the first penitentiary when the discoveries of Captain Cook in the South Seas turned the attention of the Government towards these new lands. The vast territories of Australasia promised an unlimited field for convict colonization, and for the moment the scheme for penitentiary houses fell to the ground. Public opinion generally preferred the idea of establishing penal settlements at a distance from home. "There was general confidence," says Merivale in his work on colonization, "in the favourite theory that the best mode of punishing offenders was that which removed them from the scene of offence and temptation, cut them off by a great gulf of space from all their former connexions, and gave them the opportunity of redeeming past crimes by becoming useful members of society." These views so far prevailed that an expedition consisting of nine transports and two men--of-war, the "first fleet" of Australian annals, sailed in March 1787 for New South Wales. This first fleet reached Botany Bay in January 1788, but passed on and landed at Port Jackson, where it entered and occupied the harbour of Sydney, one of the finest and most secure havens in the world. We shall return further on to the proceedings of these first criminal colonists when the pro-gress of transportation as a secondary punishment will be described.

The penitentiary scheme was not, however, abandoned on the adoption of transportation to New South Wales. It was revived and kept alive by Jeremy Bentham, who in 1791 published a work on prison discipline entitled The Panopticon or Inspection House, and followed it next year by a formal proposal to erect a prison house on his own plan. Bentham’s main idea was "a circular building, an iron cage glazed, a glass lantern as large as Ranelagh, with the cells on the outer circumference." Within, in the centre, an inspection station was so fixed that every cell or part of a cell could be at all times closely observed,—the prisoners being themselves at liberty to communicate with visitors and make known their complaints by means of tubes. He hoped to effect much in the way of reforma-tion from a system of solitude or limited seclusion, with constant employment on work in the profits of which the prisoners were to share. His project was warmly approved by Pitt, but secret influences—the personal hostility, it was said, of George III. to Bentham as an advanced Radical—hindered its adoption until 1794. A contract was then made between the treasury and Bentham, by which the latter was to erect a prison for a thousand convicts, with chapel and other necessary buildings, for £19,000. A portion of this sum was advanced, and Bentham also acquired on behalf of the Government certain lands in the neighbourhood of Tothill Fields. But the undertaking languished, and never took practical shape. Nearly fifteen years later, when the penitentiary question was again revived, Bentham’s claims were referred to arbitration, and the Government proceeded to erect the prison on its own account, "fully recognizing the import-ance of attempting reformation by the seclusion, employ-ment, and religious instruction of prisoners." This had been tried already on a small scale but with satisfactory results, first at the Gloucester prison erected in 1791 and afterwards in the house of correction at Southwell. A larger and more ambitious experiment was resolved upon, worthy of the state ; and the great penitentiary still stand-ing after many vicissitudes, but practically unaltered, at Millbank was the result of this determination. It was built on the lands originally acquired by Bentham, and the work commenced in 1813 was continued at great out-lay until 1816, when a portion was ready for the reception of prisoners. A great flourish attended its opening. Its affairs were entrusted to a specially appointed committee of eminent and distinguished personages, the chairman being the Speaker of the House of Commons. Crowds of visitors—royal dukes, foreign princes, the élite of society—came to see the new prison ; most elaborate arrange-ments were made for its internal government, and no money was spared either upon the staff or upon the com-pletion of the buildings. The sum total expended upon the latter amounted to half a million of money, and the yearly charges of the establishment were a heavy burthen on the exchequer.

The erection of Millbank was, however, a step in the right direction; The energy with which it was under-taken was the more remarkable because elsewhere through-out the United Kingdom the prisons, with but few excep-tions, remained deplorably bad. Mr Neild, who in 1812 followed in the footsteps of John Howard, found that the old conditions, overcrowding and indiscriminate inter-course, remained unchanged. "The great reformation produced by Howard," to use Neild’s own words, "was merely temporary ; . . . . . prisons were relapsing into their former horrid state of privation, filthiness, severity, and neglect." Yet the legislature was alive to the need for prison reform. Besides the building of Millbank it had promulgated many Acts for the amelioration of pri-soners. Jail fees were once more distinctly abolished; the appointment of chaplains was insisted upon; the erec-tion of improved prison buildings was rendered impera-tive upon local authorities. But these with other and much older Acts remained in abeyance. Thus an Act which provided for the classification of prisoners had re-mained a dead letter; even the separation of the males from the females was not an universal rule. Humane pro-visions intended to secure the good government of prisons, their cleanliness and ventilation, and the proper supply of food, clothing, and bedding to the prisoners were still systematically ignored. Roused by these crying evils, a small band of earnest men, philanthropists and members of the Society of Friends, formed themselves into an association for the improvement of prison discipline, and devoted themselves with rare energy and singleness of purpose to their self-constituted task. They perambulated the country inspecting all the prisons; they issued lengthy interrogatories to prison officials; they published periodi-cal reports giving the result of their inquiries, with their views on the true principles of prison management, and much sound advice, accompanied by elaborate plans, on the subject of prison construction. The labours of this society brought out into strong relief the naked deformity of the bulk of the British jails. It was the old story. Jails, speaking broadly, were lamentably inadequate for the numbers crowded into them. Hence there was the most terrible overcrowding: by day in some prisons it was nearly impossible to push through the throngs in the yards; by night the wretched prisoners ran the risk of suffocation. Prisoners were still very generally obliged to wear heavy irons. They had no regular diet—at best only dry bread. Speaking of St Albans from his personal observation, Mr Buxton, a most active member of the Society, says, "All were in ill health; almost all were in rags; almost all were filthy in the extreme. The state of the prison, the desperation of the prisoners, broadly hinted in their conversation and plainly expressed in their con-duct, the uproar of oaths, complaints, and obscenity, the indescribable stench, presented together a concentration of the utmost misery and the utmost guilt." This was no over-coloured picture ; nor did it portray a solitary instance. The reports of the Society laid bare the exist-ence of similar horrors in numbers of other jails. Yet this was in 1818, when the legislature was setting a praise-worthy example—when half a million had been spent in providing large airy cells for a thousand prisoners. Even in London itself, within easy reach of this palatial Mill-bank penitentiary, the chief prison of the city, Newgate, was in a disgraceful condition. This had been exposed by a parliamentary inquiry as far back as 1814, but nothing had been done to remedy the evils laid bare. All the shameful conditions of neglect, ill-treatment, and overcrowding were present in Newgate, and to the same extent as in any of the provincial prisons. The state of the female side had already attracted the attention of that devoted woman, Mrs Fry, whose ministrations and wonder-ful success no doubt encouraged, if they did not bring about, the formation of the Prison Society. Mrs Fry went first to Newgate in 1813, but only as a casual visitor. It was not till 1817 that she entered upon the great and noble work with which her name will ever be associated. She worked a miracle there in an incredibly short space of time. The ward into which she penetrated, although strongly dissuaded by the officials, was like a den of wild beasts; it was filled with women unsexed, fighting, swearing, dancing, gaming, yelling, and justly deserved its name of "hell above ground." Within a month it was transformed, and presented, says an eye witness, "a scene where stillness and propriety reigned." The wild beasts were tamed. It was not strange that such marvellous results should be bruited abroad, that public attention should be attracted to Mrs Fry’s labours, and that others should seek to follow in her footsteps. Movements similar to that which Mrs Fry headed were soon set on foot both in England and on the Continent, and public attention was generally directed to the urgent necessity for prison reform.

Newgate Prison, a grim and gloomy old prison in London, closed its doors for the last time in 1902 after over seven centuries of existence.

It was demolished and was demolished. All of the fittings,including the doors and gates (such as the entry gate shown in the photo above), were sold by auction.

Stimulated no doubt by the success achieved by Mrs Fry, the Prison Discipline Society continued its useful labours. Hostile critics were not wanting; many voices were raised in protest against the ultra-humanitarianism which sought to make jails too comfortable and tended to pamper criminals. But the society pursued its way undeterred by sarcasm, through evil and good report striv-ing earnestly after the objects it had in view. Many of these are now accepted as axioms in prison treatment. It is, for instance, established beyond question that female officers only should have charge of female prisoners, that prisoners of both sexes should be kept constantly employed. Yet these principles were unacknowledged at that time, and were first enunciated in Acts such as the, 4 Geo. IV. c. 65 and the 5 Geo. IV. c. 85 (1823-24), the passing of which were mainly due to the strenuous exertions of the Prison Discipline Society. It was laid down in these that over and above safe custody it was essential to preserve health, improve morals, and enforce hard labour on all prisoners sentenced to it. These Acts also provided that male and female prisoners should be confined in separate buildings, that matrons should be appointed, and schoolmasters, and that there should be divine service daily in the jails. Now at last irons were strictly forbidden except in cases of "urgent and absolute necessity," and it was ruled that every prisoner should have a bed to himself,—if possible a separate cell, the last being the first formal statement of a principle upon which all future prison discipline was to be based.

The importance of these Acts cannot be overestimated as supplying a legal standard of efficiency by which all prisons could be measured. Still the progress of improvement was extremely slow, and years after the managers of jails still evaded or ignored the Acts. Many local authorities grudged the money to rebuild or enlarge their jails; others varied much in their interpretation of the rules as to hard labour and the hours of employment. One great drawback to general reform was that a large number of small prisons lay beyond the reach of the law. Those under small jurisdictions in the boroughs and under the petty corporate bodies continued open to the strongest reprobation. Not only were they wanting in all the in-dispensable requirements as laid down by the most recent Acts, but they were often unfit for the confinement of human beings, and were described "as fruitful sources of vice and misery, debasing all who are confined within their walls." They thus remained until they were swept away by the measure which brought about the reform of the municipal corporations in 1835. But by this time a still more determined effort had been made to establish some uniform and improved system of prison discipline. In 1831 a select committee of the House of Commons went into the whole subject of secondary punishment, and re-ported that, as the difficulties in the way of an effective classification of prisoners were insurmountable, they were strongly in favour of the confinement of prisoners in separate cells, recommending that the whole of the prisons should be altered accordingly, and the expense borne by the public exchequer. There can be little doubt that this committee, like every one just then, was greatly struck by the superior methods of prison discipline pursued in the United States. The best American prisons had recently been visited by two eminent Frenchmen, MM. Beaumont and De Tocqueville, who spoke of them in terms of the highest praise. It was with the object of appro-priating what was best in the American system that Mr Crawfurd was despatched across the Atlantic on a special mission of inquiry. His able and exhaustive report, published in 1834, was a valuable contribution to the whole question of penal discipline, and it was closely and attentively studied at the time. Another select committee this time of the House of Lords, returned to the subject in 1835, and after a long investigation re-enunciated the theory that all prisoners should be kept separate and apart from one another. It also urged in strong terms the necessity for one uniform system of treatment, more especially as regarded dietaries, labour, and education, and strongly recommended the appointment of official inspectors to enforce obedience to the Acts. These recommendations were eventually adopted, and formed the basis of a new departure. This was the first indication of a system which, although greatly modified, enlarged, and improved, is in its main outlines the same as that now in force.

It must, however, be borne in mind that the prisons at home still formed an item only, and not the largest, in the scheme ofsecondary punishment. The jail was only a place of temporary detention, where prisoners awaited trial, suffered short terms of imprisonment, or passed on to the gallows or the penal colonies. The last-named was the chief outlet, for by this time the country was fully committed to the system of deportation. Since the first fleet in 1787 convicts had been sent out in constantly increasing numbers to the antipodes. Yet the early settlement at Sydney had not greatly prospered. The infant colony, composed of such incongruous materials, of guards and criminals, had had a bitter struggle for existence. It had been hoped that the com-munity would raise its own produce and speedily become self-sup-porting. But the soil was unfruitful ; the convicts know nothing of farming ; there was no one fully competent to instruct them in agriculture. All lived upon rations sent out from home ; and when convoys with relief lingered by the way famine stared all in the face. The colony was long a penal settlement and nothing more, peopled only by two classes, convicts and their masters—-criminal bondsmen on the one hand who bad forfeited their inde-peridence and were bound to labour without wages for the state, on the other officials to guard and exact the due performance of tasks. From the first it had been felt that the formation of a steady respectable class was essential to the future healthy life of the colony. But such an element was not easy to infuse into the community. A few free families were encouraged to emigrate, but they were lost in the mass they were intended to leaven, swamped and outnumbered by the cenvicts, shiploads of whom continued to pour in year after year. As the influx in creased difficulties arose as to their employment. Free settlers were too few to give work to more than a small proportion. Moreover, a new policy was in the ascendant, initiated by Governor Macquarie, who considered the convicts and their rehabilitation his chief care, and steadily discouraged the immigration of any but those who "came out for their country’s good." The great bulk of the convict labour thus remained in Government hands. This period marked the first phase in the history of transportation. The penal colony, having triumphed over early dangers and difficulties, was crowded with convicts in a state of semi-freedom, maintained at the public expense, and utilized in the development of the latent resources of the country. The methods employed by Governor Macquarie were not perhaps invariably the best ; the time was hardly ripe as yet for the erection of palatial buildings in Sydney, while the congregation of the workmen in large bodies tended greatly to their demoralization. But some of the works undertaken and carried out were of incalculable ser-vice to the young colony ; and its early advance in wealth and prosperity was greatly due to the magnificent roads, bridges, and other facilities of inter-commuuication for which it was indebted to Governor Macquarie.

But now the criminal sewage flowing from the Old World to the New was greatly increased in volume under milder and more humane laws. Many now escaped the gallows, and much of the over-crowding of the jails at home already mentioned was caused by the gangs of convicts awaiting transhipment to the antipodes. They were packed off, however, with all convenient despatch, and the numbers on Government hands in the colonies multiplied exceedingly, causing increasing embarrassment as to their disposal. Moreover, the expense of the Australian convict establishments was enormous, ans some change in system was inevitable. These were the conditions that brought about the plan of "assign-ments," in other words of freely lending the convicts to any who would relieve the authorities of the burdensome charge. By this time free settlers were arriving in greater number, invited by a different and more liberal policy than that of Governor Macquarie. Inducements were especially offered to persons possessed of capital to venture in the development of the country. Assignment developed rapidly ; soon eager competition arose for the convict hands that were at first very reluctantly taken. Great facilities existed for utilizing them on the wide areas of grazing land and on the new stations in the interior. A pastoial life, without temptations and contaminating influences, was well suited for convicts. As the colony grew richer and more populous, other than agricultural employers became assignees, and numerous enter-prises were set on foot. The trades and callings which minister to the needs of all civilized communities were more and more largely pursued. There was plenty of work for skilled convicts in the towns, and the services of the more intelligent were highly prized. It was a great boon to secure gratis the assistance of men specially trained as clerks, book-keepers, or handicraftsmen. Hence all manner of intrigues and manoeuvres were set agoing on the arrival of drafts, and there was a scramble for the best hands. Here at once was a flaw in the system of assignment. The lot of the con-vict was altogether unequal. Some, the dull unlettered and unskilled, were drafted to heavy manual labour at which they remained, while clever and expert rogues found pleasant, con-genial, and often profitable employment. The contrast was very marked from the first, but it became the more apparent, the anomaly more monstrous, as time passed on and some were still engaged in unlovely toil while others, who had come out by the same ship, had already attained to affluence and ease. For the latter transportation was no punishment, but often the reverse. It meant too often transfer to a new world under conditions more favourable to success, removed from the keener competition of the old. By adroit management, too, they often obtained the com-mand of funds, the product of nefarious transactions at home, which ivives or near relatives or unconvicted accomplices presently brought out to them. It was easy for the free new-comers to secure the assignment of their convict friends ; and the latter, although still nominally servants and in the background, at once assumed the real control. Another system productive of much evil was the employment of convict clerks in positions of trust in various Government offices ; convicts did much of the legal work of the colony ; a convict was clerk to the attomey-general ; others were schoolmasters, and were entrusted with the education of youth.

Under a system so anomalous and uncertain the main object of transportation as a method of penal discipline and repression was in danger of being quite overlooked. Yet the state could not entirely abdicate its functions, altbough it surrendered to a great extent the care of criminals to private persons. It had established a code of penalties for the coercion of the ill-conducted, while it kept the worst, perforce, in its own hands. The master was always at liberty to appeal to the strong arm of the law. A message carried to a neighbouring magistrate, often by the culprit himself, brought down the prompt retribution of the lash. Convicts might be flogged for petty offences, for idleness, drunkenness, turbulence, absconding, and so forth. At the out-stations, some show of decorum and regularity was observed, although the work done was generally scanty, and the convicts were secretly given to all manner of evil courses. The town convicts were worse, because they were far less under control. They were nominally under the surveillance and supervision of the police, which amounted to nothing at all. They came and went, and amused themselves after working hours, so that Sydney and all the large towns were hot-beds of vice and immorality. The masters as a rule made no attempt to watch over their charges; many of them were absolutely unfitted to do so, being themselves of low character, "emarici-pists" frequently, old convicts pardoned or who had finished their terms. No effort was made to prevent the assignment of convicts to improper persons ; every applicant got what he wanted, even though his own character would not bear inspection. All whom the masters could not manage-the incorrigibles upon whom lash and bread and water had been tried in vain-were returned to Government charge. These, in a word, comprised the whole of the refuse of colonial convictdom. Every man who could not agree with his master, or who was to undergo a penalty greater than flogging or less than capital punishment, came back to Government, and was disposed of in one of three ways—the road parties, the chain gangs, or the penal settlements. The convicts in the first might be kept in the vicinity of the towns or marched about the country according to the work in hand; the labour was irk--some, but, owing to inefficient supervision, never intolerable; the diet was ample, and there was no great restraint upon independ-ence within certain wide limits. To the slackness of control over the road parties was directly traceable the frequent escape of des-peradoes, who, defying recapture, recruited the gangs of bush-rangers, which were a constant terror to the whole country. In the chain or iron gangs, as they were sometimes styled, discipline was far more vigorous. It was maintained by the constant presence of a military guard, and, when most efficiently organized, was governed by a military officer who was also a magistrate.

The work was really hard, the custody close—in hulk, stockaded barrack, or caravan; the first was at Sydney, the second in the interior, the last when the undertaking required constant change of place. All were locked up from sunset to sunrise; all wore heavy leg irons; and all were liable to immediate flagellation. The convict "scourger" was one of the regular officials attached to every chain gang. The third and ultimate receptacle was the penal settlement, to which no offenders were transferred till all other methods of treatment had failed. These were terrible cess-pools of iniquity, so bad that it seemed, to use the words of one, who knew them well, "the heart of a man who went to them was taken from him and he was given that of a beast." The horrors accumulated at Norfolk Island, Moreton Bay, Port Arthur, and Tasman’s Peninsula are almost beyond description. The convicts herded together in them grew utterly degraded and brutalized ; no wonder that reckless despair took possession of them, that death on the gallows for murder purposely committed, or the slow terror from starvation following escape into surrounding wilds, was often welcomed as a relief.





The stage which transportation was now reaching, and the actual condition of affairs in the Australian colonies about this period, do not appear to have been much understood in Englan . Earnest and thoughtful men might busy themselves with prison discipline at home, and the legislature might watch with peculiar interest the results obtained from the special treatment of a limited number of selected offenders in Millbank penitentiary. But for the great mass of criminality deported to a distant shore no very active concern was shown. The country for a long time seemed satisfied with transportation. Portions of the system might be open to criticism. Thus the Commons committee of 1832 freely condemned the hulks at Woolwich and other arsenals in which a large number of convicts were kept while waiting embarka-tion. The indiscriminate association of prisoners in them produced more vice, profaneness, and demoralization than in the ordinary prisons. After dark the wildest orgies went on in them—dancing, fighting, gambling, singing, and so forth; it was easy to get drink and tobacco, and see friends from outside. The labour hours were short, the tasks light; "altogether the situation of the convict" in the hulks, says the report, "cannot be considered penal; it is a state of restriction, but hardly of punishment." But this same committee spoke well of transportation, considering it "a most valuable expedient in the system of secondary punish-ment." All that it felt necessary to suggest was that exile should be preceded by a period of severe probationary punishment in England, a proposal which was reiterated later on and actually adopted, as we shall see. It was in the country most closely affected that dissatisfaction first began to find voice. Already in 1832 the most reputable sections of Australian society were beginning to find grave fault with transportation. It had fostered the growth of a strong party—that representing convict views—-and these were advocated boldly in unprincipled prints. This party, constantly recruited from the emancipists and ticket-of-l-eave holders, gradually grew very numerous, and threatened soon to swamp the respectable, and untainted parts of the community. As years passed the prevalence of crime, and the universally low tone of morality due to the convict element, became more and more noticeable, and created greater disgust. At length, in 1835, Judge Burton raised a loud protest, and in a charge to the grand jury of Sydney plainly intimated that transportation must cease. While it existed, he said, the colonies could never rise to their proper position ; they could not claim free institutions ; in a word, Australia suffered in its whole moral aspect. This bold but forcible language commanded attention. It was speedily echoed in England, and by none more eloquently than Archbishop Whately, who logically argued that transportation failed in all the leading requisites of any system of secondary punishment. It was not formidable-criminals did not dread it; it was not corrective, but tended obviously to produce further moral debasement; it was not cheap-on the contrary it entailed great outlay without bringing any adequate returns. In the first most important object it had certainly failed. Transportation exercised no salutary terror in offenders ; it was no longer exile to an unknown inhospitable region, but to one flowing with milk and honey, whither innumer-able friends and associates had gone already. There was every chance of doing well in the new country. The most glowing de-scriptions came back of the wealth which any clever fellow might easily amass ; stories were told and names mentioned of those who had made ample fortunes in Australia in a few years. As a matter of fact the convicts, or at least large numbers of them, had prospered exceedingly. Some had incomes of twenty, thirty, even forty thousand pounds a year. They owned shops and farms and public houses and ships, drove ill carriages, and kept up grand establishments. It could be no great punishment to be put within reach of such advantages. As regarded the deteriorating effects of the system, these were plainly manifest on the surface from the condition of the colony—the profligacy of the towns, the leniency shown to crimes and those who had committed them. Down below, in the depths where the dregs rankled perpetually, in the openly sanctioned slavery called assignment, in the demoralizing chain gangs, and in the inexpressibly horrible penal settlements, were more abundant and more awful proofs of the general wick-edness and corruption. Moreover, these appalling results were accompanied by a vast expenditure. The cost of the colonial con-vict establishments, with the passages out, amounted annually to upwards of £300,000; another hundred thousand was expended on the military garrisons; and various items brought the whole outlay to about half a million per annum. It may be argued that this was not a heavy price to pay for peopling a continent and laying the foundations of our vast Australasian empire. But that empire could never have expanded to its present dimensions if it had depended on convict immigration alone. There was a point, too, at which all development, all progress, would have come to a full stop had it not been relieved of its stigma as a penal colony.

That point was reached between 1835 and 1840, when a powerful party came into existence in New South Wales, pledged to procure the abandonment of transportation. A strongly hostile feeling was also gaining ground in England. In 1837 a new committee of the House of Commons had made a patient and searching investigation into the merits and demerits of the system, and freely condemned it. The Government had no choice but to give way ; it could not ignore the protest of the colonists backed up by such an authoritative expression of opinion. In 1840 orders were issued to suspend the deportation of criminals to Now South Wales. But what was to become of the convicts ? It was impossible to keep them at home. The hulks, which might have served, had also failed; the faultiness of their internal management bad been fully proved. The committee last mentioned had recommended the erection of more penitentiaries. But the costly experiment of Millbank had been arren of results. The model prison at Pentonville, now in process of construction under the pressure of a movement towards prison reform, could offer but limited accommodation. A proposal was put forward to construct convict barracks in the vicinity of the great arsenals ; but this, which contained really the germ of the present British penal system, was premature. The Government in this dilemnia steered a middle course, and resolved to adhere to transportation, but under a greatly modified and, it was hoped, much improved form. The colony of Van Diemen’s Land, younger and less self-reliant than its neighbour, had also endured convict immigration, but had made no protest. It was resolved to direct the whole stream of deportation upon Van Diemen’s Land, which was thus constituted one vast colonial prison. The main principle of the new system was one of probation ; hence its name. All con-victs were to pass through various stages and degrees of punishment according to their conduct and character. Some general depôt was needed where the necessary observation could be made, and it was found at Millbank penitentiary. Thence boys were sent to the prison for juveniles at Parkhurst; the most promising subjects among the adults were selected to undergo the experimental disci-pline of solitude and separation at Pentonville ; less hopeful cases went to the hulks ; and all adults alike passed on to the antipodes. Fresh stages awaited the convict on his arrival at Van Diemen’s Land. The first was limited to "lifers" and colonial convicts sentenced a second time. It consisted in detention at one of the penal stations, either Norfolk Island or Tasman’s Peninsula, where the disgraceful conditions already described continued unchanged to the very last. The second stage received the largest number, who were subjected in it to gang labour, working tinder restraint in various parts of the colony. These probation stations, as they were called, were intended to inculcate habits of industry and subordination ; they were provided with supervisors and religious instructors; and, had they not been soon tainted by the vicious virus brought to them by others arriving from the penal stations, they might have answered their purpose for a time. But they became as bad as the worst of the penal settlements, and contributed greatly to the deplorable breakdown of the whole system. The third stage, and the first step towards freedom, was the concession of a pass which permitted the convict to be at large under certain conditions to seek work for himself; the fourth was a ticket-of-leave, the possession of which allowed him to come and go much as he pleased ; the fifth, and last, was absolute pardon, wil the prospects of rehabilitation.

This scheme seemed admirable on paper; yet it failed completely when put into practice. Colonial resources were quite unable to bear the pressure. Within two or three years Van Diemen’s Land was fairly inundated with convicts. Sixteen thousand were sent out in four years ; the average annual draft in the colony was about thirty thousand, and this when there were only thirty-seven thousand free settlers. Half the whole number of convicts remained in Government hands, and were kept in the probation gangs, engaged upon public works of great utility ; but the other half, pass-holders and ticket-of-leave men in a state of semi-freedom, could get little or no employment. The supply greatly exceeded the demand; there were no hirers of labour. Had the colony been as large and as prosperous as its neighbour it could scarcely have absorbed the mass of workmen ; but it was really on the verge of bankruptcy—its finances were embarrassed, its trades and industries at a standstill. But not only were the convicts idle ; they were utterly depraved. It was soon found that the system which kept large bodies always together had a most pernicious effect upon their moral condition. "The congregation of criminals in large batches without adequate supervision meant simply wholesale widespread pollution," as was said at the time. These ever-present and con-stantly increasing evils forced the Government to reconsider its position ; and in 1846 transportation to Van Diemen’s Land was temporarily suspended for a couple of years, during which it was hoped some relief might be afforded. The formation of a new con-vict colony in North Australia had been contemplated ; but the project, warmly espoused by Mr Gladstone, then under secretary of state for the colonies, was presently abandoned ; and it now became clear that no resumption of transportation was possible.

Some fresh scheme had to be devised, and that with-out delay. The task fell upon Sir George Grey as home secretary, who, in dealing with it laid the foundations of the present British penal system. This system was to consist (1) of a limited period of separate confinement in a home prison or penitentiary, accompanied by industrial employment and moral training; (2) of hard labour at some public works prison either at home or abroad ; and (3) of exile to a colony with a conditional pardon or ticket-of-leave. No pains were spared to give effect to this plan as soon as it was decided upon. Pentonville was available for the first phase; Millbank was also pressed, into the service, and accommodation was hired in some of the best provincial prisons, as at Wakefield, Leicester, and else-where. Few facilities existed for carrying out the second stage, but they were speedily improvised. Although the hulks at home had been condemned, convict establish-ments in which these floating prisons still formed the principal part were organized at Bermuda and Gibraltar. Neither of these, it may be stated at once, was a conspicuous success ; they were too remote for effective super-vision; and, although they lingered on for some years, they were finally condemned. The chief efforts of the authorities were directed to the formation of public works prisons at home, and here the most satisfactory results were soon obtained. The construction of a harbour of refuge at Portland had been recommended in 1845 ; in 1847 an Act was passed to facilitate the purchase of land there, and a sum of money taken up in the estimates for the erection of a prison, which was commenced next year. At another point Dartmoor, a prison already stood available, although it had not been occupied since the last war, when ten thousand French and American prisoners had been incarcerated in it. A little reconstruction made Dartmoor into a modern jail, and in the waste lands around there was ample labour for any number of convict hands. Dartmoor was opened in 1850; two years later a convict prison was established at Portsmouth in connexion with the dockyard, and another of the same class at Chatham in 1856. The works undertaken at these various stations were of national importance, and the results obtained extremely valuable, as will presently be shown. The usefulness of these public works prisons and the need for their development soon became apparent. Although the authorities still clung to the principle of transportation, that punishment grew more and more difficult to inflict. The third stage in Sir George Grey’s scheme contemplated the enforced emigration of released convicts, whom the discipline of separation and public works was supposed to have purged and purified, and who would have better hopes of entering on a new career of honest industry in a new country than when thrown back among vicious associations at home. The theory was good, the practice difficult. No colony would accept these ticket-of-leave men as a gift. Van Diemen’s Land, hither-to submissive, rebelled, and positively refused to receive them, even though this denial cut off the supply of labour, now urgently needed. Other colonies were no less resolute in their opposition. The appearance of a convict ship at the Cape of Good Hope nearly produced a revolt. Athough Earl Grey addressed a circular to all colonial Governments, offering them the questionable boon of transportation, only one, the comparatively new colony of Western Australia, responded in the affirmative. But this single receptacle could not absorb a tithe of the whole number of convicts awaiting exile. It became necessary therefore to find some other means for the disposal of those so rapidly accumulating at home. Accordingly, in 1853 the first Penal Servitude Act was passed, substitut-ing certain shorter sentences of penal servitude for trans-portation. It was only just to abbreviate the terms; under the old sentence the transportee knew that if well conducted he would spend the greater part of it in the comparative freedom of exile. But, although sentences were shortened, it was not thought safe to surrender all control over the released convict ; and be was only granted a ticket-of-leave for the unexpired portion of his original sentence. But no effective supervision was maintained over these convicts at large. They speedily relapsed into crime; their numbers, as the years passed, became so great, and their depredations so serious, especially in garotte robberies, that a cry of indignation, led by general alarm, was raised against the system which exposed society to such dangers. There was a vague desire to return to transportation—to rid the country once more, by removal to far-off points, of the criminals who preyed upon it. The usual panacea for all public grievances was presently tried, and the system with which Sir Joshua Jebb’s name had come to be identified was arrigned before a select com-mittee of the House of Commons in 1863.

Before reviewing the report of this committee, it will be well to retrace our steps and examine the phases through which prison discipline had passed since 1836. We left this, which embraces the preliminary stages of secondary punishment, at a date when public attention was very generally drawn to it. The true object of penal treatment had begun to be understood, and keen controversy had arisen as to the best methods for securing it. This object, broadly stated, was to compass the reformation of the convicted offender and at the same time deter others from crime. The chief experiments in this direction had been made in the United States, where two remarkable systems of penal discipline had for some time been in operation. Each had its warm supporters and friends. One had originated with the Quakers of Pennsylvania, who, as far back as 1786, had denounced capital punishment and all other purely personal penalties, and had subjected all offenders instead to solitary confinement with little occupa-tion for mind or body. This, as developed in the years following, became the purely solitary system, and was the first of the two methods mentioned above. The idea, although not absolutely new, having been already accepted in the United Kingdom both in the Gloucester penitentiary and the Glasgow bridewell, was hailed with enthusiasm as a solution of all difficulties of prison treatment. Many other States in the Union followed the lead of Pennsyl-vania. That of New York built the great Auburn peni-tentiary in 1816 to carry out the new principles. There every prisoner was kept continuously in complete isolation. He saw no one, spoke to no one, and did no work. But within a short period very deplorable results began to show themselves at Auburn. Many prisoners became insane; health was impaired, and life greatly endangered. Mr Crawfurd, whose mission to the United States has been already referred to, was in favour of solitary confinement, but he could not deny that several cases of suicide followed this isolation. Some relaxation of the disastrous severity seemed desirable, and out of this grew the second great system, which was presently introduced at Auburn, and afterwards at the no less renowned prison of Sing Sing. It was called the silent system. While the prisoners were still separated at night or meals, they were suffered to labour in association, but under a rule of silence ruth-lessly and rigorously maintained. The latter, entrusted to irresponsible subordinates, degenerated into a despotism which brought the system into great discredit. All discipline officers were permitted to wield the whip sum-marily and without the slightest check. "The quantity of punishment," says Mr Crawfurd, "is entirely dependent on the will of the overseers, against whose acts there is no appeal." Under such a system the most frightful excesses were possible, and many cases of brutal cruelty were laid bare. Reviewing the merits and demerits of each system, Mr Crawfurd gave in his adhesion to that of unvarying solitude as pursued in the Eastern Penitentiary in Penn-sylvania. "I have no hesitation in declaring my con-viction," he says, "that its discipline is a safe and efficacious mode of prison management"; of the opposite system, that of Auburn, he reports that, notwithstanding the order and regularity with which its discipline was enforced, "its effects were greatly overrated."

Mr Crawfurd came back from the United States an ardent champion of the solitary system. To use his own words, "so greatly does increasing experience prove the importance of solitude in the management of prisons that I could not, if circumstances admitted, too strongly ad-vocate its application in Great Britain, for every class of offenders as well as for persons before trial, under modifica-tions which would divest seclusion of its harshest character." He saw great difficulties in making this the universal rule, chief among which was the enormous expense of providing suitable prisons. Some modification of the rule of unbroken solitude would be inevitable; but he strongly urged its adoption for certain classes, and he was equally convinced of the imperative necessity for giving every prisoner a separate sleeping cell. It is clear that the Government endorsed Mr Crawfurd’s views. Where it was possible they gave effect to them at once. At Millbank, with its spacious solitary cells, the rule of seclusion was more and more strictly enforced under the supervision of a reverend governor, also a warm partisan of the system. Ere long permissive legislation strove to disseminate the new principles. In 1830 Lord John Russell had given it as his opinion that cellular separation was desirable in all prisons. But it was not until 1839 that an Act was passed which laid it down that individuals might be con-fined separately and apart in single cells. Even now the executive did not insist upon the construction of prisons on a new plan. It only set a good example by under-taking the erection of one which should serve as a model for the whole country. In 1840 the first stone of Pen-tonville prison was laid; and, after three years of very considerable outlay, its cells, 520 in number, were occupied on the solitary, or more exactly the separate, system,—the latter being somewhat less rigorous and irksome in its restraints. To the credit of many local jurisdictions, they speedily followed the lead of the central authority. Within half a dozen years no less than fifty-four new prisons were built on the Pentonville plan, which now began to serve generally as a "model" for imitation, not in England alone, but all over the world. That able administrator Sir Joshua Jebb, who presided over its erection, may fairly claim indeed to be the author and originator of modern prison architecture.

Other jurisdictions were less prompt to recognize their responsibilities, the city of London among the number. They were satisfied with small makeshifts and modifica-tions, without entering upon that complete and radical reconstruction which could alone meet the case. From this inertness there followed a lamentable want of uni-formity in the administration of legal penalties. Crimi-nals suffered more or less punishment according to the locality in which they were incarcerated. Dietaries differed—here too high, there too low. The amount of exercise allowed varied greatly; there was no universal rule as to employment. In some prisons hard labour was insisted upon, and embraced treadwheels or the newly invented cranks; in others it was industrial, devoted to manufactures; while in some it did not exist at all. The cells inhabited by prisoners (and separate cellular confinement was now very general) were of different dimen-sions,—variously lighted, warmed, and ventilated. The time spent in these cells was not invariably the same, and as yet no authoritative decision had been made between the solitary and silent systems. The first-named had been tried at Pentonville, but the period for which it was deemed possible had been greatly reduced. The duration bad been at first fixed at eighteen months, but it was in-contestably proved that the prisoners’ minds had become enfeebled by this long isolation, and the period was limited to nine months. In many jurisdictions, however, the silent system, or that of associated labour in silence, was still preferred, and there might be prisons within a short distance of each other at which two entirely different systems,of discipline were in force. In 1849 Mr Charles Pearson, M.P., moved for a select committee to report upon the best means of securing some uniform system which should be at once punitive, reformatory, and self--supporting. He urged that all existing plans were inefficacious, and he advocated a new scheme by which the labour of all prisoners should be applied to agriculture in district prisons. The result of a full inquiry was the reiteration of views already accepted in theory, but not yet generally adopted in practice. The committee re-commended separation, so long as it was conducted under proper safeguards; it animadverted upon the great variety which still existed in prison discipline and the construction of jails and strongly urged the legislature to entrust full powers to some central authority who would exact adherence to the rules laid down. Thirteen more years elapsed and still no such steps had been taken. A new committee sat in 1863, and in its report again re-marked, and in no measured terms, upon the many and wide differences that still existed in the jails of Great Britain as regards construction, diet, labour, and general discipline, "leading to an inequality, uncertainty, and inefficiency of punishment productive of the most pre-judicial results." Even yet separation was not univer-sal ; labour, dietaries, education—everything varied still. Matters could only be mended by the exercise of legisla-tive authority, and this came in the Prison Act of 1865, an Act which consolidated all previous statutes on the subject of prison discipline, many of its provisions being still in force. It promulgated minute and precise regula-tions on every item of prison management, and backed them up with pains and penalties that ought to have ensured attention. Yet the years passed and uniformity was still far from secured ; it was impossible, indeed, while prison administration was still left to a number of local authorities, no two of which were often of the same mind. Great varieties of practice still obtained. The number of feet ascended at hard labour on the treadwheel differed indifferent districts; each jurisdiction still pleased itself as to dietaries ; and it was still, as of old, a mere accident of locality whether imprisonment was light or heavy. The legislature had tried its best, but its best had failed. It had exercised some supervision through its inspectors, had forbidden cells to be used until duly certi-fied as fit, had threatened to withhold exchequer contri-butions from prisons of which unfavourable reports were re-ceived. Such penalties had exercised no sufficient terrors. It began to be understood, moreover, that the prisons- under local jurisdictions were not always conveniently and economically situated. In one district there might be too many, in another not enough; one prison was empty and its neighbour full to overflowing; yet there was no power to make transfers and equalize accommodation. All this produced excessive, even wasteful, expenditure. Nor was its incidence, under altered conditions, exactly fair. Crime, with the many facilities offered for rapid locomotion to those who committed it, had ceased to be merely local, and the whole state rather than individual communities ought to be taxed; prison charges should be borne by the exchequer, and not by local rates. These considerations gained strength, and led at length to the introduction of the Prison Bill which became law in 1877, and which is the last Act passed for the regulation of prisons. By the Act of 1877 the control of all jails was vested in a body of prison commissioners appointed by, and responsible to, the home secretary. These commis-sioners had power to consolidate by closing superfluous prisons, to establish one system of discipline, and gene-rally by watchful supervision, aided by the experience of specialists, to maintain that much desired uniformity which had been so long and unsuccessfully sought. At the same time the co-operation of the local magistrates was invited so far as advice and assistance were concerned ; but all real power and control had passed from their hands into that of the commissioners of prisons. The system established by the Act of 1877 is that now in force, and we shall recur to it directly, in recapitulating the whole of our present method of secondary punishment.

Meanwhile considerable changes had been introduced into penal servitude, the punishment reserved for the gravest offences. We left this branch of the subject at a date (1863) when its efficiency was about to be tested by a parliamentary inquiry. The verdict given was in the main satisfactory; but doubts were expressed as to the severityof the discipline inflicted, the principal features of which were moderate labour, ample diet, and substantial gratuities. The first was far less than the work free men did for a livelihood, the second larger, the third exces-sive, so that convicts often left prison with thirty, forty, even eighty pounds in their pockets. Penal servitude, to use the words of the lord chief justice, Sir Alexander Cockburn, one of the members of the committee, "was hardly calculated to produce on the mind of the criminal that salutary dread of the recurrence of the punishment which may be the means of deterring him, and through his example others, from the commission of crime." The chief recommendations put forward to mend the system comprised lengthening of all sentences, a diminution in the dietaries, the abolition of large gratuities, and, speak-ing broadly, a general tightening of the reins. The most notable change, however, was in regard to labour, the quantity and value of which was to be regulated in future by the so-called "mark system." This plan had originated with Captain Maconochie, at one time superintendent in Norfolk Island, who had recommended that the punish-ment inflicted upon criminals should be measured, not by time, but by the amount of labour actually performed. In support of his theory he devised an ingenious system of recording the convicts’ daily industry by marks, which on reaching a given total would entitle them to their release. The mark system had already been tried with good results in Ireland, where the Irish system, as it was called, introduced by Sir Walter Crofton had attracted widespread attention from the extraordinary success which seemed to follow it. There had been a very marked diminution in crime, attributable it was supposed to the system, which was in almost all respects the same as the English, although the Irish authorities had invented an "intermediate stage" in which convicts worked in a state of semi-freedom, and thus practised the self-reliance which in many superinduced reform. As a matter of fact the diminution in crime was traceable to general causes, such as a general exodus by emigration, the introduction of a poor law, and an increase in the facilities for earning an honest livelihood. It may be added here that, judged by later experience, the Irish system has evinced no transcendent merits, and it is now (1885) moribund. But we owe something to the Irish practice which first popularized the idea of maintaining a strict supervision over convicts in a state of conditional release, and it recon-ciled us to a system which was long wrongfully stigmatized as espionage. The mark system, as recommended by the committee of 1863, and as subsequently introduced, had, however, little in common with either Maconochie’s or the Irish plan. It was similar in principle, and that was all. According to the committee every convict should have it in his power to earn a remission—in other words, to sborten his sentence by his industry. This industry was to be measured by marks, earned by hard labour at the public works, after a short probational term of close "separate" confinement. But the remission gained did not mean absolute release. All males were to be sent, during the latter part of their sentences, "without disguise to a thinly peopled colony," to work out their time and their own rehabilitation. The committee, it will be seen, still clung to the old theory of transportation, and this in spite of the lively protests of some of its members. The one outlet remaining, however, that of Western Australia, was soon afterwards (1867) closed to convict emigrants; and this part of the committee’s recommendations became a dead letter. Not so the mark system, or the plan of earning remission by steady industry. This was carried out on a broad and intelligent basis by officials prompt to avail themselves of the advantages it offered; a readiness to move with the times, to adopt suggestions tending towards improvement, and generally to benefit by external advice and experience, has always characterized, convict prison administration in recent years. Remedies have been at once applied where flaws were found. Thus in 1877-78 efforts were made to minimize contamination by segregating the worst criminals, and restricting conversa-tion at exercise. Again, the recommendation of the latest commission of inquiry, that of 1878-79, tending in the same direction was immediately adopted, and a special class was formed in 1880 in which all convicts "not versed in crime," first offenders or at least comparatively innocent men, are now kept apart from the older and more hardened criminals. While these concessions have been cheerfully made, the stern necessities of a penal system have been rigorously maintained. The committee last quoted gave it as their opinion that "penal servitude as at present administered is on the whole satisfactory ; it is effective as a punishment and free from serious abuses ; . . . . . . a sentence of penal servitude is now generally an object of dread to the criminal population." This change is ascribed to the various improvements introduced—"longer sentences, spare diet, and generally a more strict enforcement of work and discipline."

Having thus traced the history of secondary panish-ments and prison discipline in England from the earliest times to the present day, it will be well to describe briefly the system of penal repression as now actually in force. This will best be effected by following those who break the law through all stages from that of arrest, through conviction, to release, conditional or complete. After a short detention in a police cell—places of durance which still need improvement—an offender, unless disposed of summarily, passes into one of Her Majesty’s local prisons, there to await his trial at sessions or assizes. The period thus spent in the provinces will never exceed three months; in London, with the frequent sittings at Clerkenwell and of the Central Criminal Court, it is seldom more than one month. While awaiting trial the prisoner may wear his own clothes, provide his own food, see and communicate with his friends and legal adviser, so as to prepare fully for his defence. His fate after conviction depends on his sentence. If this be imprisonment, so called to distin-guish it from penal servitude, although both mean depriva-tion of liberty and are closely akin, it is undergone in one of the "local" prisons—the prisons till 1878 under local jurisdiction, but now entirely controlled by the state through the home secretary and the commissioners of prisons. The régime undergone is cellular; able-bodied prisoners are kept in strict separation for at least one month, and during that time sub ected to first-class hard labour, which is purely penal in character; and nowadays, under the uniform system introduced by the commis-sioners, consists of the treadwheel, in which each indivi-dual ascends 8640 feet in a day’s work, or six hours’ work on cranks or hard labour machines is exacted where there are no treadwheels; and the labour, whether of treadwheel or crank, is generally utilized as the motive power for grinding corn or pumping water for prison use. Beating oakum with a heavy beater and mat-making with heavy implements are also considered first-class hard labour. A system of progressive stages not unlike the mark system has been adopted in the local prisons, and the prisoner’s progress through each depends on his own industry and good conduct. During the first month he sleeps on a plank bed, a wooden frame raised from the floor, with bedding but without mattress. When be has earned the proper number of marks, which at the earliest cannot be until one month has elapsed, he passes into the second stage, and is allowed better diet, and a mattress twice a week. The third stage, at the end of the third month, gives him further privileges as regards diet and bed. The fourth stage concedes to the prisoner a mattress every night, and the privilege, if well conducted, to communicate by letter or through visits with his friends outside. These stages are applicable to females except as regards the plank bed; while youths under sixteen and old men above sixty are also allowed mattresses. A small gratuity may be earned during the second and three following stages, amounting in the aggregate to ten shillings. The labour, too, may be industrial, and include instruction in tailoring, shoemaking, basket-making, book-binding, printing, and many more handicrafts. Throughout the sentence the prisoner has the advantage of religious and moral instruction; he attends divine service regularly and according to his creed, is visited by the chaplain, and receives educational assistance according to his needs. His physical welfare is watched over by-competent medi-cal men ; close attention is paid to the sanitary condition of prisons ; strict rules govern the size of the cells, with their lighting, warming, and ventilation. Dietaries are everywhere the same; they are calculated with great nicety according to the terms of durance, and afford variety and ample nutrition without running into excess. In a word, as regards discipline, labour, treatment, exactly the same system obtains throughout the United Kingdom from Bodmin to the far north, from Cork to Belfast.

Where the sentence passes beyond two years it ceases to be styled imprisonment and becomes penal servitude, which may be inflicted for any period from five years to life. The prisoner becomes a convict, and undergoes his penalty in one or more of the convict prisons. These are entirely under state management. A sentence of penal servitude, as now administered, consists of three distinct periods or stages:—(1) that of probation endured in separate confinement at a so-called "close" prison; (2) a period of labour in association at a public works prison; and (3) conditional release for the unexpired portion of the sentence upon licence or ticket-of-leave. (1) In the first stage, which is limited to nine months for reasons already given, the convict passes his whole time in his cell apart from other prisoners, engaged at some industrial employment. He exercises and goes to chapel daily in the society of others, but holds no com-munication with them; his only intercourse with his fellow creatures is when be is visited by the governor, chaplain, schoolmaster, or trade instructor. This period of almost unbroken solitude, when the mind, thrown in on itself, is supposed to be peculiarly open to lessons of ad-monition and warning, is one of severely penal character, and its duration has therefore been wisely limited. It is deemed, moreover, that perpetual seclusion in a cell is an artificial state of existence, that its infliction for long terms would altogether unfit an offender for a return to the ordinary conditions of daily life. (2) The second is a longer stage, and endures for the whole or a greater part of the remainder of the sentence,ts duration being governed by the power a convict holds in his own hands to earn a remission. It is passed at a public works prison,either at Borstal, Chatham, Chattenden, Ports-mouth, Portland, Dartmoor, or (for the present) Worm-wood Scrubs. While cellular separation, except at work, at prayers, or exercise, is strictly maintained, labour is in association under the close and constant supervision of officials. Intercommunication no doubt takes place; men working together in quarry, brickfield, or barrow-run, and out of earshot of their guardians, may and do converse at times. But the work is too arduous to allow of long and desultory conversation ; while the chance of mutual con-tamination is now minimized by the separation of the less hardened from the old offenders in the manner already pointed out. There is no reason to suppose that any great evils result from this association, and without it the execution of the many important national public works which now attest its value would have been impossible. Among these may be mentioned the following:—the quarrying of stone for the great Portland breakwater, which is nearly 2 miles in length, and between 50 and 60 feet deep in the sea, with the defensive works on the Verne, batteries, casemates, and barracks intended to render the island of Portland impregnable, and the enlargement and extension of the dockyards at Chatham and Portsmouth ; at the former three grand basins 20, 21, and 28 acres respectively in extent have been completed on the marshy lands and reaches of the Medway, and at the latter extensive operations of the same kind have long been in progress. At Borstal a line of forts intended to protect Chatham on the southern and western side are being erected by convicts; they are also building magazines at Chattenden on the left bank of the Medway; they will soon be at work at Dover on the vast improve-ments for the enlargement of the harbour and port. Besides this, convict labour has been usefully employed in the erection of prison buildings at new points or in exten-sion of those at the old at Borstal cells for five hundred, and at Wormwood Scrubs for ten hundred and fifty-two have been built, with chapel, quarters, hospitals, and so forth; large additions have been made to the prisons of Woking, Pentonville, Chatham, Portsmouth, Dartmoor, Parkhurst, and Brixton. In all cases the bricks have been made, the stone quarried and dressed, the timber sawn, the iron cast, forged, and wrought by the prisoners ; only one article was bought ready made, and that was the locks. The great merit of this system is the skill acquired in handicrafts by so many otherwise idle and useless hands. Convict mechanics are rarely found ready made.

A return dated July 1882 shows that 82 per cent. of the total number employed at trades had learnt them in prison. These results are no doubt greatly aided by the judicious stimulus given to the highest effort by the mark system. The chief objection to enforced labour has been the difficulty in ensuring this; but the convict nowadays eagerly tries his best, because only thus can he win privi-leges while in prison and an earlier release from it. Everyday’s work is gauged, and marks recorded according to its value; upon the total earned depend his passage through the stages or classes which regulate his diet and general treatment, and more especially his interviews and com-munications with his relations and friends. Yet more; steady willing labour continuously performed will earn a remission of a fourth of the sentence, less the time spent in separate confinement. It must be borne in mind that the marks thus earned may be forfeited at any time by misconduct, but only to this extent does conduct affect remission, and the latter is really directly dependent upon industry. The full remission in a five years’ sentence is one year and twenty-three days; in seven years, one year two hundred and seventy-three days ; in fourteen, three years one hundred and eighty-one days; in twenty, four years eighty-six days. "Lifers" cannot claim any remission, but their cases are brought forward at the end of twenty years, and then considered on their merits. (3) Having, earned his remission, the convict enters upon the third stage of his punishment. He is released, but only conditionally, on licence or ticket-of-leave. This permission to be at large may easily be forfeited. Stringent conditions are endorsed upon the licence, and well known to every licence holder. He has to produce the licence when called upon; he must not break the law, nor asso-ciate with notoriously bad characters, nor lead an idle dissolute life, without visible means of obtaining an honest livelihood. The observance of these rules is enforced by the, police, to whom Acts known as the Prevention of Crimes Acts give large powers. The licence holder is ordered to report himself at intervals to the police, to whom also he must notify any change in his place of residence; he must take care that he is not found in any suspicious locality under suspicious circumstances. A breach of the regulations may entail the forfeiture of the licence, with imprisonment and the obligation to return to a convict prison to serve out the unexpired term of penal servitude. Police supervision by special sentence of a court may be extended in the case of habitual criminals to longer periods than that of the original sentence. An elaborate machinery also exists for the registration of these habitual criminals, and voluminous official records are regularly published and circulated giving detailed in-formation, distinctive marks, and previous history, to enable the police in all parts of the country to identify habitual criminals. A system so rigorous towards offenders who have already expiated their crimes may be deemed to bear heavily on any who have repented of their evil ways and are anxious to turn over a new leaf. To be ever sub-jected to the intrusive watchfulness of the myrmidons of the law must often increase the licence holder’s difficulty of leading ani honest life. The struggle is often severe; employers of labour are not too ready to accept the services of "jail birds," and free workmen often resent the admission of an old convict amongst their number. Private charity has happily come forward to diminish or remove this hardship, and many societies have been called into existence for the special purpose of assisting dis-charged prisoners. The first of these, now honoured with the title of "Royal," was organized in 1856, and had assisted, up to 1879, some eleven thousand prisoners. This society labours chiefly in the metropolis; it is sup-ported by private subscriptions, but it has control also over the gratuities of the licensees who accept its aid. The prisoners on release are first examined at the society’s office as to their prospects and wishes; they are given some pocket money out of their own gratuities; and their "liberty clothing," a present from the prison, is changed for more suitable clothes. They are then placed in respectable lodging-houses until in due course employ-ment is obtained for them, after which the society under-takes the reporting to the police, and by its own agents exercises a watchful care over its protegds. There are now upwards of twenty societies established in various parts of the country, and the number is rapidly increasing.





The foregoing system is applicable more particularly to adult males; but for females the rules are much the same as regards imprisonment and penal servitude. But the remission a female convict can earn is greater, and amounts to a third of the sentence, less the separate con-finement. Moreover, female convicts whose conduct and character warrant a hope of complete amendment are admitted into "refuges" nine months before the date of their conditional release on leave. There are two of these refuges, which are more like "homes" than prisons,—the Westminster Memorial Refuge at Streatham for Protest-ants, and the East End House, Finchley, for Roman Catholics. The training of these refuges is calculated to fit the licensee for more complete freedom, and many of the women who go from them into the world do well. The aid societies also help effectually in obtaining situations, often very good ones, for the released female convicts. Juvenile criminals are now subjected to special treat-ment. Young offenders, although liable to be treated as adults by the court before which they are brought, are generally dealt with summarily under various powers, exercised, in some cases in England and Ireland, with the consent of the accused, or, in the case of a child, of the parent or guardian. The discretionary powers of summary courts are wide, ranging in many cases from dismissal (although the charge is proved) to payment of damages and costs, or fine, or limited imprisonment, and in the case of a male child with private whipping either in addition to or instead of any other punishment; and whipping in addi-tion to other punishment may be imposed by all courts on the trial of male offenders under sixteen for the majority of offences. For the very important power of relegating juvenile offenders to reformatory schools and vagrant and neglected children to industrial schools see the separate article, REFORMATORY AND INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS (q.v.).

Juvenile offenders and children while detained in re-formatory or industrial schools are not subject to prison discipline, but the rules for the management and dis-cipline of the schools and the detention in them may be enforced by imprisonment. Very beneficial results as re-gards the diminution of crimes are undoubtedly obtained by various institutions, both public and private. The possible criminal is removed from evil associations while still amenable to better influences; and while still malle-able he is taught to labour honestly with his hands. Prison statistics, more especially of the convict prisons, show a marked decrease in the number of youthful offenders in durance, and it is reasonble to suppose that from the causes above mentioned there is a gradual stoppage in the supply. In the ten years between 1871 and 1881 the number in custody of ages between fifteen to twenty-four fell from 2948 to 1957, and this although the general population had increased four millions. The same reduction has shown itself as regards the number of the same ages in local prisons; and it is clear that the improvement is general.

Uniformity in prison discipline is now general through-out the United Kingdom. The Prisons Act of 1877 also extended to Scotland and Ireland, and in both those countries the system of imprisonment for terms of two years and under has been assimilated to that in force in England. As regards penal servitude, convicts pass through the same stages or periods; but Scottish convicts, after undergoing their separate confinement in the general prison at Perth, have been drafted into the English public works prisons. Of late there has been a movement towards securing some of the advantages of convict labour for works north of the Tweed, and it is probable that harbour works will soon be undertaken at one or more points on the Scottish coast. For Ireland, the progressive periods are passed in that country,—separate confinement in Mountjoy prison, public works at Spike Island. The administration of prisons has also been assimilated in Great Britain and Ireland, and has been centralized in each capital under the authority of the state. Boards of prison commissioners in London, Edinburgh, and Dublin, and acting under the immediate orders of the executive, control all local prison affairs, including finance, victualling, clothing, the appoint-ment of officers of all grades, and the discipline of prisoners. The English convicts are still managed by an independent board called the directors of convict prisons, but both commissioners and directors have the same chairman and chief, while the staff of clerks and accountants and store-keepers—in a word, the whole administrative machinery—-is identical for both. The welfare of the inmates of all prisons is not, however, left entirely at the discretion of official managers. The local magistracy have still a certain jurisdiction in the local prisons; through elected re-presentatives styled "visiting committees," they constantly inspect the prisons and exercise supervision over their inmates. They have retained their power to punish and generally deal with all cases of aggravated misconduct. The functions exercised by these visiting committees might seem to constitute a dual authority in prison management. But so far the two powers have worked harmoniously and well. Since 1880 unofficial and unpaid visitors have also been appointed to undertake an inde-pendent inspection of the convict prisons. This practice was introduced, riot on account of any administrative failure in the system, but as a safeguard against possible abuses, and to strengthen public confidence. These visitors can give no orders, but they are empowered to make full inquiries into the state of the prisoners and the condition and discipline of the prison.

The sum voted in 1883-84 for convict establishments in England was £414,463, but this includes £18,100 for expenditure in colonies where a few imperial convicts still survive, and grants in aid of colonial magistrates, police, and jails. The vote for local prisons in the same year was £481,852. The returns from male prisoners’ labour in the convict prisons in 1883-84 amounted to £248,995, 11s. 3d. Of this total, £121,956, 5s. 2d. represented the estimated value, by measurement, of labour on public works, and £42,159, 8s. 4d. more the value of, prison buildings erected, while the earnings in manufactures amounted to £37,581, 8s. 8d. The balance was the farm and the work performed for the prisons. The female convicts’ labour amounted in the same year to £9933, 9s. 5d., half of which was in washing and manufactures. In the local prisons in England manufactures brought in £39,790, 3s. 11d. The value of the labour on prison buildings was £24,510, 4s. 2d., and that in the service of the prisons £59,562, 0s. 8d, The prison vote in Scotland for 1883-84 was £110,170, the returns from earnings £6000; in Ireland the vote was £145,689 and the earnings £4000. The above terms of expenditure include all outlay-staff (superior and subordinate), maintenance, travelling expenses, &.c.

Most civilized nations have considered the question of discipline from time to time, and have endeavoured, but with varying degrees of earnestness, to conform to accepted modern ideas as to tte proper method of dealing with criminals. The subject has also been dealt with at two international congresses, one of which assembled in London in 1873, and the other at Stockholm in 1878, when views were exchanged and matters of much interest discussed. It is proposed now to supplement the foregoing account of British prison discipline by a brief survey of the prison systems in force in the British dependencies and in various other countries.

British Colonies and India.—The prison systems of most of the British colonies have been assimilated as far as possible to that in force in the mother country. In all the larger colonies there are convict prisons and local prisons, and in all cellular separation for the whole or part of the sentence is the rule. This is the case in the Australian colonies, in Tasmania, and in New Zealand.

The prison system of Canada is advanced and enlightened. The numbers incarcerated are not great, and crime is not very prevalent. Six establisbments suffice for the Dominion—Kingston, St Vincent de Paul (for the province of Quebec), Halifax, Manitoba, British Columbia, and Dorchester. The last-named has replaced that at St John’s. All these are cellular prisons; and they receive prisoners of all categories, for trial and after sentence whatever the term. Females have a special quarter in each prison. Isolation is strictly carried out for all short sentences ; but for the longer labour is in association. A great deal of good work is turned out in the Canadian prisons. All the rolling stock for railways in Government hands, iron-work, clothing, and boots and shoes are produced at the various pnsons, but not to an extent to allow all prisoners to be instructed in trades. Most of the prisons possess land in their vicinity which is tilled by the prisoners. There are no prisoners’ aid societies as yet in Canada, although their formation has been earnestly recommended.

For the Cape of Good Hope there is a good prison at Cape Town. In Ceylon, since 1867, cellular separation has been enforced for the whole period of short sentences, and the first six months of long sentences. In Jamaica there are several kinds of prisons, but only the principal, the general penitentiary, has any number of separate sleeping cells.

In India the jails number upwards of 230, with an indefinite number of small lock-ups. There is also the large convict depôt at Port Blair in the Andaman Islands. Very few of the Indian jails are entirely cellular; two in particular may be mentioned, that of Utakamand and that of Hazaribagh, both of which are for European convicts. "The remainder," says Dr Mouatt, formerly inspector general of prisons in Bengal, "are built on every conceivable plan; a large number of them are miserable mud structures, which are constantly being washed away by heavy rain, and as constantly provide work for the prisoners in repairing them." A few of them are radiating, and nearly all provide for the separation by night of the male and female prisoners ; and there is a certain rough classifica-tion according to sentence. All work is in association, except when prisoners are kept in cells for misconduct. The proportion of cell accommodation, when Dr Mouatt wrote, was barely 10 per cent. Work is mostly intramural, and generally remunerative and in-dustrial. Prisoners are occasionally employed out of doors in gangs upon canals and other public works. The ironing of prisoner where prisons are insecure still prevails as a safeguard againt escape. Prison punishments are generally severe, and include flogging, fetters, penal labour, and complete isolation. The whole question of prison discipline in India is strictly subordinated to financial considerations, and the svstem in consequence lacks uniformity and completeness.

Austria.—It was not until 1867 that the Austrian Government declared in favour of a system of cellular imprisonment. Till then all prisoners had been kept in association, but at the date above mentioned a recommendation that separation should be the rule was made to the reicbsrath and approved. Owing to the expense of reconstructing or converting prisons, the principle could riot be generally adopted ; moreover, the Austrian authorities were not in favour of continuous isolation. Hence the practice adopted was a combination of the two methods. Short imprisonments might be endured entirely in separate cells; every prisoner might pass the first part of a long term in a cell, but the isolation was not to exceed eight months, the remainder of the sentence to be undergone in association or collectively, due regard being had to the classifica-tion of the prisoners brought together. This classification is based upon the individual’s age, education, state of mind, and former life, and the nature of his crime. The progress made in the erection of cellular prisons has not been very rapid. Although the total number of prisoners in Austria-Hungary exceeds 17,000, up to the end of 1879 only 1050 cells had been provided, viz., at Gratz 252, at Stein 348, at Pilsen 387, and at Karthaus 63, while two small prisons for trial prisoners have also been built at Cilli and Reichen-berg. These new prisons are, however, very complete and perfect ; they have all modern appliances, chapels, hospitals, workshops, and baths ; the cells are spacious, and well ventilated, lighted, and warmed. Two days of cellular imprisonment, after three months have elapsed, count as three in association. There is no distinctly penal labour. In separation prisoners follow such trades as shoe-making, tailoring, weaving, button-making, wood-carving; women are employed in embroidery, spinning, quill-pen making, and knitting. In association the principal employments are carpentering, coopering, smith’s work, brick-making; and a number of the more trustworthy prisoners have helped to construct railways and lay down roads. As a rule the prisoners’ labour is let out to contractors ; this plan is preferred as relieving the state of all risks, while officials are more at liberty to attend to the pure disciplinary treatment of the prisoners. As a rule every prisoner who enters ignorant of a trade is taught one in prison. Prisoners can earn substantial wages ; where contractors are employed, the prisoners receive half what is paid over, after all costs have been deducted. Half of tbe earnings may be spent in the prison canteen in the purchase of luxuries, including beer and tobacco, or in the support of a prisoner’s family, or in the purchase of clothing to be worn on discharge. There is only one "Liberated Prisoner Aid Society," which is established at Vienna, and which does good service in supporting prisoners until they find occupation, and providing them with money, clothes, and tools. Speaking generally, there are three classes of prisons in Austria-Hungary, viz., for minor offences, and for prisoners sentenced to terms less than one year and to terms of one year and upwards respectively. The treatment of the incarcerated is humane : their diet is sufficient ; they have good beds and bed-ding; the sick are cared for in hospitals ; the labour of the able--bodied is not excessive, although supposed to extend over ten hours daily. Religious services are provided for, and non-Roman-Catholic prisoners may be seen by ministers of their own form of faith. Prison administration is under the minister of justice, who delegates his powers to an inspector general of prisons. Commissions of inspection are appointed to visit all the cellular prisons monthly, and there are also local boards of management and control.

Belgium.—Prison discipline has perhaps received as close attention in Belgium as anywhere in the world. In 1835, ivhen the great movement towards prison reform was in progress, Belgium first adopted the cellular system experimentally by constructing thirty-two cells in connexion with the old prison at Ghent. After a trial of nine years a verdict was passed in favour of cellular separa-tion and it was authoritatively adopted in 1844. Progress was ceady if not rapid ; by degrees many cellular prisons were built; and up to the present date (1885) twenty-four are in existence. A model prison for 600 on the same plan is in process of construction at Brussels, and three others, smaller, will soon be finished. Belgium has unhesitatingly accepted the rule of absolute separation as regards all prisoners, whatever the duration of their sentences. That solitude which disastrous results in England bave strictly limited to either nine months, or, under certain modifications, to two years, may be enforced in Belgian prisons for at least ten years. At the end of that period a prisoner may claim to go into association, and they are then removed to Ghent, where they work and eat in company but have separate sleeping cells. Separation, again, is not insisted upon with the sickly, or those whose minds appear weak; while all upon whom cellular imprisonment has failed may also in due course be removed to association. But for the rest the separate system is the invariable rule, and it is carried out with careful and unvarying sternness. The prisoner never leaves his cell save for chapel or exercise ; at the former he is in a separate box or compartment; the latter he takes alone in a narrow yard. His life, however, is not one of absolute solitude. He is visited frequently by his warders and schoolmasters and trade instructors; chaplain, governor, and doctor also break the monotony of his life. According to the Belgian view of the case, he "lives in association with the prison staff," not with his fellow criminals. It is claimed for this system, which aims primarily at the reformation of individuals, that no evil consequences have as yet been seen to follow from the treatment. Official statistics may be searched in vain for the record of cases of suicide or of mental alienation ; neither are abnormally frequent. On the other hand the Belgian authorities insist that the dread of the punishment has had a marked effect upon crime, and that there is a diminution in the number of second sentences. "Recidivists," or reconvicted. prisoners, are, moreover, subjected to a more rigorous discipline.

There are three classes of prisons in Belgium,—the maisons d’arrêt, or prisons of detention, for accused persons undergoing examination or awaiting trial; the maisons de sûreté, or prisons for the infliction of short sentences ; and the maison centrales, which correspond to the English convict prisons. Prisoners awaiting trial, and still innocent in the eyes of the law, are treated with much leniency and consideration. An arrangement peculiar to the French and Belgian prisons is the privilege of the "pistole." A prisoner on payment of a certain charge is conceded better accommodation ; he has a room, not a cell, decently furnished, and may provide his own food, have books, see his friends, and do no work. Offenders of the better class, and never previously convicted, are sometimes relegated specially to the pistole by the tribunals ; and the local boards of visitors have also power to transfer prisoners to this privileged class. Independent of the pistole the law provides three kinds of penalty-correctional imprisonment, seclusion, and imprisonment with hard labour. But, except the slight differences as regards privileges of letters and visits, the treatment is identical in all three categories. It is correctional for all; all prisoners are kept in seclusion ; and there is no hard labour, as we understand it. Purely penal labour does not exist in the Belgian prisons. Public works are obviously impossible; and there are no tread-mills or cranks. The labour is entirely industrial ; but its object is rather to reform individuals than to produce profit to the state. With strict cellular confinement the range of prison industries is generally limited to sedentary employment; but, besides weaving, tailoring, shoemaking, book-binding, and so forth, various handicrafts are practised. The prisoner’s labour is partly let out to contractors, partly utilized by the authorities. A portion of the earnings for work done goes to the prisoners ; and part of the money may be spent in the purchase of better food or tobacco, where it is permitted, from the canteen. No pains are spared to instruct the prisoners ; those ignorant of any trade are regularly apprenticed and taught, the idea being to provide every one with a means of livelihood on release. The severity, not to say cruelty, of the strict rule of separation is mitigated as far as possible by the pater-nal solicitude of the authorities. The administrative arrangements of the Belgian prisons are nearly perfect. The buildings are spacious—the balls lofty, light, and airy ; the cells are of ample dimensions, carefully ventilated, well-lighted, and well-warmed. An abundant water supply assists the sanitary services ; dietaries are sufficient and well-chosen, soup with plenty of vegetables forming an especial feature in them. School instruction is available for all. There are well-supplied libraries. The hospitals are clean and us, fitted with every necessary, and the percentage of patients under treatment is usually small. An epidemic of oplithadmia was, however, long present in the reformatory prison of St Hubert. An independent system of visitation is supposed to protect the prisoners from ill usage ; local boards composed of local functionaries exercise constant supervision and control over the prisons in their vicinity. The central administration is intelligent; and the prison service being esteemed highly honourable attracts good men to recruit its ranks. Female prisons are exclusively managed by the nuns of some religious order in the locality. Besides the prisons of punishment for adults, there are two establishments in Belgium which deal exclusively with juvenile crime. These are at St Hubert in Luxemburg, and at Namur. The first, dating from 1840, is an agricultural colony which receives all youths up to the age of fourteen ; the labour is exclusively in the fields. Young criminals belonging to the towns are sent to Namur, where the work is mechanical but more sedentary. A good education both moral and practical is received at these reformatories, which are more like schools than prisons. There are also philanthropic schools for vag-rants and non-criminal children. At present no societies labour to assist prisoners on release. A complete organization once existed for the purpose, but it was wholly official, and those whom it was supposed to benefit suspected and kept aloof from it. It may be added that, although there is no power in the prisoners’ own hands of working out remission by steady industry and good conduct, sentences may be abbreviated on these grounds on the recommendation of the son authorities. All sentences, too, have been shortened since the general introduction of cellular imprisonment; as the treatment was more severe, justice demanded a curtailment of the penalties. Capital punishment, although not definitively abolished, is never inflicted, and all sentenced to death pass into prison for life. But after ten years they too are transferred to Ghent for the remainder of their days.

Brazil.—The present emperor of Brazil has long taken an active interest in prison reform. He has encouraged the prison adminis-tration of his country to introduce a scheme which is in many respects the same as that in force in England. Prisoners, after sentence, are subjected to a period of close cellular confinement enduring eight months ; they then pass to another prison, where cellular separation is still enforced, but the daily labour is in associa-tion and in silence. This is styled the reformatory stage; after that comes the third stage, which is reached by marks gained through industry and good conduct. In this last stage, called the testing staae, prisoners work together ; they may converse, may wear their owe cloths, and are under the care and supervision of the most own clothes, and are un trustworthy of their fellows. They sleep in large dormitories, not in cells, are allowed to cultivate a piece of garden ground on their own account, and a large portion of their earnings is placed to their credit and handed over to them on release.

Denmark.—The prison system in force in Denmark dates from 1840, previous to which time the arrangements were extremely unsatisfactory. In the early part of the century Danish prisons were in as deplorable condition as any in Europe ; after enduring indescribable horrors, the worst malefactors passed on to hard labour in the fortresses or in the fleets. But a commission was appointed in 1840 to report, and recommended the adoption of the cellular system for all prisoners awaiting trial, and under short-term sentences,—those condemned to long imprisonments to be put to hard labour in association. The necessary prisons were con-structed at a cost, within a quarter of a century, of two millions of pounds. There are a large number of small detention prisons, and four principal prisons for the convicted ; one cellular for males at Vridsloesville, and two associated at Horsens and Viborg, one for females combined cellular and associated at Christianshavn. About 75 per cent. of the whole are sentenced to separative confinement in cells ; its infliction is limited to first offenders, youths, or those sentenced to six months and upwards to three years and a half; the associated or aggregate system applies to the reconvicted, and for terms from two years to life. There is no distinctly penal labour in the prisons ; the industrial prevails, and is in the hands of contractors. Prisoners in cells are constantly visited ; religious and secular instruction is imparted ; the dietaries are carefully cal-cudated, and the régime generally intelligent and humane.

A number of aid societies have been established at the seat of the large prisons, which assist prisoners on release who have been dili-gent and well conducted in confinement. Work is found, tools and subsistence given, as in England. It is interesting to note that the first aid society was formed at Copenhagen in 1841 through the exertions of Mrs Fry. Besides the regular prisons, there are three reformatories for juveniles modelled on the French school at Mettray; they have been founded by private benevolence, but re-ceive aid from the state. Agriculture is the principal employment of the inmates.

France.—Prisons and their management have not attracted close or continuous attention in France. Dynastic changes, wars, revolu-tions, and intestinal troubles may be pleaded as the excuse. A system based on the principle of individual separation as practised in the United States was on the point of being adopted in France when the legislation to secure it was interrupted by the revolution of 1848. Under the empire the question was generally subordinated to more pressing political needs. Cellular imprisonment was, how-ever, adopted partially, but only to a limited extent, for persons awaiting trial. Central prisons in which the prisoners lived and worked in association had been established early in the century, and their use was extended. They received all sentenced to the shorter terms. The long-term convicts went to the bagnes, the great convict prisons at the arsenals of Rochefort, Brest, and Toulon ; and in 1851, a few years after it had been abandoned by England, transportation to penal colonies was adopted by France. In 1869 Napoleon III. appointed a commission to inquire and report upon the whole question, but its labours were rudely interrupted by the Franco-Gertnan War. Three years later a fresh commission, appointed by the national assembly to discuss parliamentary reform, made a most exhaustive report in 1874. It unhesitatingly recommended cellular confinement, and the principle became law the following year. This system of prison discipline then became applicable to all persons awaiting trial, to those sentenced to any term up to a year and a day, and to those for longer terms provided they asked to be kept separate and apart. It was calculated by the commission first mentioned that there were nearly eight thousand cells already in existence and available, but an additional twenty-one thousand would have to be constructed at an outlay of sixty-three millions of francs in order to meet the demands of this liciv system. A model cell was designed and plans for model prisons but the expense the change ,vould entail appears to have deterreh French authorities, both the central executive and the conseils généraux, from promptly making it. There are not more than ten or a dozen cellular prisons in France, and two of them are in Paris—Mazas (for trial prisoners) and La Santé, but the latter is not entirely cellular. The construction of others has been contemplated, but in few cases proceeded with, and many years will probably elapse before any uniformity in penal treatment is established in France.

Prison administration is complex in France, and there are many kinds of prisons,—a few of them being under the authority of the minister of the interior:—(1) the maison d’arrêt, temporary places of durance in every arrondissement for persons charged with offences, and those sentenced to more than a year’s imprisonment who are awaiting transfer to a maison centrale; (2) the maison de justice, often part and parcel of the former, but only existing in the assize court towns for the safe custody of those tried or condemned at the assizes ; (3) the depôt situated on the island of Ré, for all sentenced to travaux forcé awaiting deportation to New Caledonia (Arabs so sentenced wait at Avignon tbeir removal to French Guiana); (4) departmental prisons or houses of correction, for summary con-victions, or those sentenced to less than a year, or, if provided with sufficient cells, those amenable to separate confinement; (5) the maisons centrales, or central prisons, for all sentenced to more than a year, or for men and women above sixty sentenced to travaux forcés ; (6) maisons de force, for women sentenced to travaux forcés, or both sexes condemned to seclusion ; (7) prisons for those sen-tenced to simple detention ; (8) penal settlements in Corsica, more particularly at Chiavari, Casabianca, and Castellucio, the régime of which is the same as in the maisons centrales ; (9) reformatory establishments for juvenile offenders ; and (10) depôtsde sûreté, for prisoners who are travelling, at places where there are no other prisons. The total number of prisons of all classes in France, exclusive of the last, exceeds 500, and the prison population averages 50,000 daily. Besides the foregoing there are a certain number of military prisons under the war minister seated at the great garrison towns, or in Algeria ; and at all the seaports there are maritime prisons for soldiers or sailors who have broken laws civil or military. The latter are under the minister of marine, who also has special charge of the penal settlements at a distance from France, including French Guiana and New Caledonia, where there are several prisons and hulks adapted for the confinement of convicts. The disciplinary treatment of all prisoners in separate confinement is much the same in France as elsewhere; the isolation while it lasts is com-plete and is broken only by the frequent visits of officials. The exer-cise is solitary, and at chapel the same rule obtains by each prisoner occupying a separate box, or by having service in the centre of the prison, to which all the cell doors, slightly opened, converge. It may be stated here that religious tolerance prevails everywhere; and prisoners not Roman Catholics may receive the ministration of clergymen of their own creed. Female prisons are mostly managed by nuns or members of the female religious orders. There is one at Doullens especially kept for Protestant female prisoners, and managed by a Protestant sisterhood. The evils of association in the congregate prisons are diminished by classification, so far as it goes. But prisoners are at least kept in categories: trial prisoners are together ; those for a year are kept apart from the summary convictions, and convicts en route for the island of Ré from all the rest. Males and females occupy different prisons. As almost all prisons have at least a few separate cells, these are utilized either for the recidivists and those of worst character, or for any well-disposed prisoners who exhibit a real desire to amend. The diet, although coarse, is liberal. It may be supplemented by purchase made from the canteen, at which both wine and tobacco may be obtained by all who can pay for it. Each person may thus spend a certain proportion of his earnings or pécule, the rest being reserved for his discharge. What remains of the product of the prisoner’s labour is handed over to the contractor, who also receives a grant per prisoner from the state. Labour is only obligatory upon those so sentenced ; it is purely industrial ; penal labour, such as treadmill or crank, does not exist in French prisons. In the smaller it is not easy to find occupation for the inmates, but in the larger many and various industries are carried on. Among the more ordinary trades the manufacture of "articles de Paris," toys, neat bonbon boxes, hosiery, and cabinet-making produce, good finan-cial returns. The labour of the prisoners in Corsican settlements has been usefully directed upon the reclamation of marshy lands, the clearing of forests, and the tilling of the less fertile districts. The agricultural results have been good as regards the cultivation of the orange, olive, and vine; mulberry trees have been planted for the silk-worm, and the wheat fields have returned rich harvests of grain, much esteemed in Italy and the south of France. Good roads and many canals have been made, to open up the interior. These Corsican prisons have long suffered from the unhealthiness of their neighbourhood, but the draining of the marshes, the development of irrigation, and the plantation of trees have all combined to improve their sanitary conditions.

The efforts made in France, more particularly by private bene-volence, to cope with juvenile delinquency have been very praise--worthy. French reformatories are of two classes—those that are punitive or correctional, and those that are simply reformatory. To the first, where the discipline is severe, are sent all youths con-victed of offences committed with full knowledge of their crimi-nality, and these relegated from the reformatories as insubordinate ; to the second, children proved guilty but not responsible for their acts, or the ill-conducted whose parents cannot manage them. The first-named are public institutions maintained by the state ; the latter are private, and may be supported entirely by subscriptions. There are in all thirty-eight of the former, as well as five penal colonies, and five juvenile quarters attached to various departmental prisons ; of the latter there are twenty-eight. All these are for males. For females there are twenty-three private establishments and one public. The most important of the public reformatories for boys is that of La Petite Roquette in Paris, immediately opposite the convict prison of the same name, in front of which executions are carried out. Of the private institutions that of Mettray near Tours, started by the benevolent enterprise of M. de Metz, has a world-wide reputation. A very successful female re-formatory is that of Darnétal near Rouen, where the women are employed in farming and field operations.

As regards the most heinous offenders, France not only clings to deportation, but is disposed to enlarge and multiply her penal settlements. In 1884 the Government had under consideration the necessity for sending out all "recidivists" to the Polynesian islands. This, however, has been hindered for the moment by the energetic protest of the Australian colonies, and, instead of the number sent to New Caledonia being increased, French Guiana will probably be more largely utilized. In the former islands most of the evils which attended the early days of transportation to Australia have been apparent. The French convicts either remain in the hands of the Government incarcerated in badly constructed prisons, where discipline and supervision are unsatis-factory or incomplete, or they pass into a state of semi-freedom to work for free settlers on their own account. There are not enough of the latter to afford much employment, and the conditions of the soil of New Caledonia are not such as to encourage the convicts to work for themselves. It is extremely improbable that the penal settlement will ever grow into a prosperous selfsupporting colony, and thus the chief end of deportation remains unachieved. At present the French penal settlements beyond sea are merely badly-built indifferently-managed prisons at a long dis-tance from home.

Germany.—There is a similarity in the prison discipline of the various units of the German empire. In the grand-duchy of Baden there are four kinds of prisons—district prisons, fortresses, houses of correction, and central prisons. The punishment in the two first named is simply detention or privation of liberty,—the district prisons being for persons under examination and waiting trial, or those sentenced to less than six weeks’ imprisonment. Sentences above that time are endured in the central prisons. The principle of cellular imprisonment is the general rule, but it is not extended, unless at a prisoner’s wish, beyond three years. For youths between twelve and eighteen the limit is six months. Prisoners unfit for solitary confinement and those who have en-dured three years’ detention are kept together, but they are not associated during working hours. Both systems are supposed to be attended with good results in Baden. Both have their merits, but popular feeling inclines most to the cellular plan as conducing to reform while it keeps the prisoners from mutual contamination, The chief cellular prison is at Bruchsal, where there is accommoda-tion for five hundred, but there are a certain number of separate cells attached to many other prisons. The labour in the prisons is industrial as opposed to penal; contractors are not encouraged; and in most prisons the administration itself keeps the employment of the prison in its own hands. Forty per cent. of the prisoners on admission are ignorant of any trade, but they do not leave prison without learning one. Prisoners’ aid societies exist in twenty-nine out of fifty-nine districts, and they achieve good results, although their aid is not too frequently invoked.

The bulk of thes prisons in Bavaria, mostly converted castles and convents, are on the collective system, but there are four cellular prisons—one at Nuremberg, and three other district prisons for those awaiting trial. The prisons are much the same as in Baden. There are police prisons for first arrests district prisons mentioned above, which also take short sentences prisons for three months sentences and upwards, and for juveniles; and houses of correction. There are also special prisons set apart for persons convicted of theft, fraud, robbery, receiving, whose sentences exceed three months ; and a system of classification exists which separates all likely by their previous character to exercise a baneful influence on their fellows. For the long-term prisoners the labour may be upon public works beyond the walls of the jail, and prisoners may de-mand to be so employed, or in work for which they are fit. Industry and good conduct will secure a remission of sentence. After three months of the sentence have been served there is no purely penal labour. Industrial labour is conducted by the prison authorities, who are not in favour of the employment of contractors, which is thought to jeopardize discipline. Secular education is not over--looked; there are hospitals, chapels, libraries, and the administration generally is humane. There are numerous societies to assist discharged prisoners, which, however, are said to be much hampered in action by the ignorance and prejudice of the public. One at Munich has nevertheless done great good.

There are but few prisons in Prussia in which isolation is exclu-sively carried out. But in forty-six cellular and associated im-prisonment exist side by side ; the total number of cells is, however, small when compared with the total population in prison. The advantage of introducing the system of "progressive stages," of passing from strict separation to labour in association, is anxiously discussed, but nothing yet has been done. Prussian prisons may be classed as—(1) those exclusively for hard labour, (2) those for imprisonment and simple detention, and (3) those of a mixed character. Hard-labour sentences may be for any term from one year to life; the labour is compulsory, without restriction, both inside and be-yond the walls. The maximum of simple imprisonment or deten-tion is for five years, during which time a prisoner is not compelled to work except in accordance with his capacity and the position he occupied in social life; nor need he work outside the prison against his will. Imprisonment in a fortress, which maybe for life and the minimum of which is for one day, means simple deprivation of liberty. There is also a detention on summary conviction for vag-rants and beggars limited to six weeks. These may be made to work inside or outside the prison. There is no penal labour; but much variety and enterprise exist as regards the prison industrial employ-ments, which, in addition to the ordinary kinds, include feather--scraping, leather-dressing, turning, carving, illuminating, &c. The males also farm; the women make gloves, cigars, and tapestry, embroider, knit, weave, and spin. The work is carried on through contractors, who pay a certain sum on the amount produced. A portion of their earnings goes to the prisoners,—half of it to be expended in buying extra food, half accumulated against release. To reduce evils of association it is ordered that first sentences shall be separated from hardened offenders, but this classification is not always possible ; juvenile prisoners are, however, kept apart in cells. Release, provisionally, may take place after three-fourths of the sentence has been endured with good conduct, but the licence to be abroad may be revoked for a breach of law. There are many prisoners’ aid societies, the best being in Rhenish Prussia and Westphalia, but the results obtained have not been very satis-factory. Employers and free workmen will not receive liberated prisoners freely, and the aid societies would effect more if they were more centralized and worked more together. Prussian prisons are on the whole well organized ; the discipline is severe yet just ; order reigns everywhere ; secular instruction and religious minis-trations are ample, and the employment of prisoners according to their capacities is carefully attended to. But many of the prisons require rebuilding or reconstruction ; isolation at night should be the universal rule ; and more cells are needed to ensure the separa-tion of the trial prisoners and short sentences. Administrative centralization is much needed in Prussia.

Prison discipline has attracted close attention in the kingdorn of Saxony since 1850, when the penitentiary at Zwickau was first opened and conducted with satisfactory results. In 1854 it was decreed that all Saxon prisons should follow the same system, which is that of treatment either solitary or associated according to individual wants ; neither rule obtains exclusively, and the prisons have facilities for both. Work, education, and diet are supposed to be carefully allotted to prisoners. The prisons follow the usual classification of German prisons ; there are those for severe punishment, two in number, three for less severe punishment, and two for the older offenders. Besides these there are the fortresses and the prisons of detention. The labour is purely industrial, not penal ; Saxony is a very industrial country, and its prisons produce nearly every article of manufacture. Work is carried out in them partly by contractors and partly by the authorities. In the five reformatories agriculture is the principal occupation. A graduated system of remission of sentences is in force, dependent on industry and conduct.

In Würtemberg the cellular system was adopted for women in 1865, and a prison on that plan erected at Heilbronn, which has since been utilized exclusively for men. The bulk of the Würtem-berg prisons are, however, still on the collective system ; but at all prisons there are places for the isolated detention of a certain number of prisoners. The classification of prisons is much the same as in other parts of the German empire under the penal code of the empire. There is no distinction between penal and industrial labour ; the latter is of the varied character followed in other German prisons, and is partly in the hands of contractors, partly in that of the administration. An aid society has existed in Würtemberg since 1831, and it has numerous ramifications through the country. It does good service in obtaining work, providing tools, and assisting emigration.

Italy.—There is a want of uniformity in the prison system of the Italian kingdom, which is not strange, having regard to the recent unification of the country. The various units which were till recently independent of each other had each its own views. Many varieties of prison discipline, therefore, still remain in force. There are some prisons in which complete isolation is the rule, others where the labour is associated with cellular separation at night. But the largest number are on the collective system. All new prisons of detention are built on the principle of isolation, and this rule is as far as possible strictly observed for all prisoners awaiting trial. This period of detention may be spent in a provincial (carcere centrale), district (circondarale), or communal (mandamentale) jail. Sentences are carried out according to their character in different prisons. There are prisons for those condemned to simple confinement and detention ; others for "relegates" ; others again for reclusion accompanied with hard labour; and twenty are bagnios or hard-labour prisons for those sentenced for long periods (up to life), to undergo the punishment of the ergastolo or galera. The discipline is progressive. In the ordinary prisons a gradual amelioration of condition may be secured by good conduct; in the bagnios, besides the exemption from fetters, convicts may gain the privilege of completing the last half of their sentences in one or other of the agricultural colonies.

These have been established in various islands of the Tuscan archipelago, as at Pianosa and Gorgona: and an intermediate prison has been established, on the island of Capraia for well-conducted prisoners in a last stage of semi-liberty. Associated convict labour produced good results in Italy. By it all necessary prison buildings have been erected at the penal colonies and at various points on the mainland; it has also been applied to agriculture, the reclamation of land, the construction of storehouses, docks, salt works, and on the improvement of various ports. In the prisons or penitentiaries the labour is industrial, and follows the usual lines. Contractors have generally the control of this labour, receiving the results after deductions for prisoners’ earnings to be spent in the usual way and with the obligation to teach trades. On the latter condition contractors are granted the exclusive right to the labour of juveniles in houses of correction ; and there are a number of reformatory schools, mostly on a charitable basis, into which are drafted all juveniles, vagrants, and idlers sentenced to compulsory detention.

Mexico.—In Mexico the rule of constant separation for all prisoners has been accepted, but not yet carried out entirely. The old prisons were on the associated system ; but new cellular prisons have recently been built, or are in process of construction at Jalisco, Durango, Puebla, and Mexico. These will receive trial prisoners and those sentenced. There is an "hospicio de pobres" for young children ; also a special reformatory establishment for children between nine and eighteen. Political offenders are kept apart from ordinary offenders. All convicted prisoners may earn conditional release on completion of half their whole sen-tence. This form of release is called preparatory liberty, and for a short time preceding it they are allowed to leave the jails to run errands or seek work. The labour in Mexican prisons is indus-trial, not penal, and in theory at least the advantages of learning a trade in prison are fully understood. Contracts for prison labour are forbidden. A portion of the proceeds goes to the prisoners, and may be spent in purchasing food or furniture or articles of comfort. There are "protective boards" who visit and seek to improve the prisoners, and independent philanthropists are also admitted. Prisoners on release go to the protective boards, who assist in obtaining them an honest livelihood.

The Netherlands.—Here the treatment a condemned prisoner andergoes depends mainly upon the sentence awarded. The judge at his discretion may direct the imprisonment to be on the solitary or the associated System. This power as regards the first is, however, limited to half the whole term of sentence, and in 1851 it could only be applied to sentences of one year ; this was extended in 1864 to two years, and in 1871 to four years,—so that now the maximum of cellular imprisonment to be inflicted is actually limited to two years. There are several prisons on the cellular plan ; but in most the two kinds of imprisonment exist side by side. There are four classes of prisons:—(1) the central prisons for persons sentenced to eighteen months and upwards ; (2) detention prisons for less than eighteen months ; (3) prisons of arrest for those sen-tenced to three months or less; and (4) police or central prisons for those condemned to one month and under. In the three last named are also kept prisoners awaiting trial. As regards classification nothing more is attempted where association is the rule than the separation of the most hardened and previously convicted offenders from other prisoners. Imprisonment is either simple detention or accompanied by hard labour. The latter is industrial only, never penal, and embraces a great variety of handicrafts, most of which are carried out under contractors. But work is also done on account of the state, with the advantage that it is not subject to the fluctuations of supply and demand. All prisoners, except those for short terms, are, if possible, taught a trade. The earnings go in part to the prisoners, to be expended by them in the usual way. Remissions of sentence not exceeding six months may be accorded to all originally condemned to not less than three years, and who have undergone at least half. There is a society for the moral amelioration of prisoners in the Netherlands, which has numerous ramifications, and is devoted to prison visiting and the welfare of prisoners generally. This extends to efforts to obtain employment for them on release, which are praiseworthy, and on the whole eminently successful.

Norway.—Prisons in Norway may be divided into two principal classes, the Strafarbeidesanstalter, or penal institutions where prisoners are compelled to labour, and the district prisons established in 1857 for detention and simple imprisonment. (1) The first may be further subdivided into fortress prisons, houses of correction, and the cellular prison or penitentiary of Christiania. This last takes the first convicted for short terms between the ages of eighteen and thirty, the fortresses the longer sentences, and the houses of correction the intermediate terms. All these prisons except that of Christiania are on the associated system, with no attempt at classification beyond the separation of the worst from the least corrupt in workshops or dormitories. The hours of labour are long—fourteen in summer and ten in winter. The labour, conducted solely by the authorities, is industrial; at Christiania cloth manufacture is a principal trade, at Akershuus it is stonecutting. Most prisoners learn a trade if they are ignorant of one on reception. No portion of the proceeds of their labour goes tothe prisoners. There is no regular system of granting remis-sions. All the penal institutions have chaplains, schools, libraries, and hospitals. Released prisoners are, as far as possible, preserved from relapse by the care taken to provide them with work when free. There are a few aid societies, but their operations are somewhat circumscribed from want of means. (2) The district prisons, fifty-six in number, take summary convictions from four to two hundred and forty days. Imprisonment may be endured on bread and water with regulated intervals, or on the jail allowance. Prisoners in these prisons are not compelled to work, but they can have employment if they wish it. These district jails are also used for the detention of all persons apprehended and awaiting trial, and as debtors’ prisons. They are mostly on the cellular plan, especially in the cases of those sentenced to solitary confinement on bread and water and those committed for trial.

Portugal is still behindhand as regards its prison administra-tion. The jails are extremely defective in construction ; the disci-pline is lax and the management careless. All prisons are on the associated plan ; they stand mostly in the market places of the large towns, with the first-floor windows upon the public thorough-fares, so that the inmates are at liberty to talk and communicate with the passers by, whom they importune constantly for alms. Little less lamentable than the neglect of prison discipline is the practice of indefinitely postponing jail deliveries, with the inevit-able consequence of frequent failures of justice. Juries often will not convict, alleging that the accused have been sufficiently pun-ished by long detention awaiting trial.

Russia.—Prison discipline was much discussed in Russia as far back as the commencement of the present century, and in the year 1819 a society, now known as the Imperial Society, was established to watch over the administration of prisons. This society still exists, and is affiliated to the ministry of the interior. Its central committee and the provincial committees working under it select the staff of the prisons, and exercise a general surveillance over them. Various classe of prisons have existed in European Russia. As at ent organized they consist of—(1) the fortresses, for grave offenders, especially the political and revolutionary,—in these the discipline is very severe ; (2) the military prisons, in which the discipline is not less strict ; (3) the house of detention, the ancient ostrog or stronghold which every town has always had for the safe keeping of prisoners charged with offences,—in these were detained also prisoners awaiting corporal punishment or deporta-tion to a penal colony; (4) the hard-labour prisons, in which were located the labour parties or correctional corps instituted by the emperor Nicholas, organized and disciplined on a military basis; (5) the amendment prisons or houses of industry established by the empires Catherine. These are all on the associated system, and fall very far short of accepted ideas on prison management. But an entirely new cellular prison has recently been erected in St Peters-burg, which is a model of its kind. It is a house of detention for persons awaiting trial, and contains upwards of a hundred cells. All the internal arrangements of this prison are excellent; but it may be doubted whether the Russian Government will embark upon the expenditure necessary to build others of the class. The eman-cipation of the serfs in 1867, followed by the substitution of imprisonment for corporal punishment, added enormously to the prison population of Russia. A great increase of prison accom-modation became necessary, and a commission was appointed to frame a new penitentiary system. This, as now adopted, although not entirely carried out, consists of two parts—punitive imprison-nient for short sentences, and penal probationary detention as a pre-liminary to banishment to a colony. For the first, central prisons, associated not cellular, are being constructed at various points, and a regulated system of labour will be introduced following the lines of that in force in other European countries. For the second, at the end of the probationary period banishment, or, as it is styled in official language, enforced colonization, will be the rule.

Deportation to Siberia began in 1591. It was principally used for political prisoners, insurgents, religious dissenters, and con-spirators. Large numbers of Poles were exiled in 1758 ; others again in 1830, and now, since the Nihilist movement, numbers of these. implacable foes to the existing régime are regularly despatched to Siberia. The total number deported varies from 17,000 to 20,000 per annum, but this includes wives and children who may elect to accompany the exiles. The sentences are of two kinds—(1) the all rights and (2) the loss of particular rights. The first includes degradation, the rupture of the marriage tie, inability to sign legal documents, to hold property, or to give a bond. The exile must wear prison dress, and have his head half-shaved. He may be flogged, and if murdered would not be much missed. After a lengthened period of probation in prison the exile becomes a colonist and may work on his own account. Those sentenced to the loss of particular rights are only compelled to live in Siberia, where they may get their living as they can. Many, however, are condemned to spend a portion of their time in confinement but without hard labour. The exiles are sent from all parts of the empire by rail or river to Ekaterinburg, and thence to Tiumen, whence they are distributed through Siberia. Those deprived of partial rights are generally located in western Siberia. Those deprived of all rights go on to eastern Siberia. The latter go by river generally to Tomsk ; thence they walk to their ultimate restplace, which may be Irkutsk or Yakutsk or Tchita, or the island of Saghalien, and the journey may occupy months. Not long ago a party of convicts was despatched by sea to the last-named destination, embarking at Odessa and travelling through the Suez Canal and by the Pacific Ocean. There are several hundred prisons in Siberia. They are of three kinds:—(1) the etape, which afford temporary lodgings for prisoners on the line of march ; (2) the prisylnie, where the detention is often for several months during the winter or until the ice is broken up ; and (3) the ostrog, the generic Russian name for a prison, which is the place of durance for all exiles not on their own resources. Few of the large prisons in Siberia were built for the purpose. They are converted buildings—old factories, distilleries, and so forth. They are all upon the associate principle, containing a number of large rooms to accommodate any number from twenty-five to a hundred. The great central prison near Irkutsk, called the Alexandreffsky, one of the most important in Siberia, generally holds from 1600 to 2000 prisoners all under sentence of hard labour, and awaiting transfer to the mines. Dr Lansdell, who visited this prison in 1879, found the prisoners very short of work. Some were engaged in making cigarette papers, others in shoemaking and brickmaking. The prison is a huge stone-built building, very different from the ordinary run of Siberian prisons, which are usually built of logs caulked with moss to keep out the cold. They are surrounded by a high wooden palisade. Each prison has its hospital, chapel, generally a schoolroom, and a few workshops. The prisoners themselves are not unkindly treated. At most of the stations there are local committees to watch over the welfare of the Prisoners. This is an extension of the Imperial Society of St Petersburg already mentioned. The committees supply books and visit the prisoners. They clothe and educate the prisoners’ children, and help their wives to employ-ment. They also augment the prisoners’ diet from funds obtained by subscription. The regulation rations of Siberian exiles seem very liberal. The Russian prisoner has nearly twice the amount of solid food that an English prisoner receives, and be is at liberty to add to his diet out of his own means, which the English prisoner is not. The prisoners are also supplied with ample clothing if they have none of their own, those sentenced to deprivation of all rights being obliged to wear convict dress. The discipline of the prisons is now in accordance, with European ideas. Prison offences are punished by relegation to a solitary cell, a certain number of which exist at all the prisons. Diminutions of diet are also inflicted, and an obligation to wear irons if they are not already worn. All exiles wear leg-irons for a certain time. These are riveted on to the ankles, and caught by a chain which is carried suspended to a belt round the waist. The irons are worn for various periods from eighteen months to four and even eight years. Very heinous offenders or those who have escaped frequently are chained to a wheelbarrow, which they are obliged to pull about with them wherever they go. A more severe punishment when confinement and irons fail is birching with a rod, for the knout is now abolished. The rod consists of switches so small that three may be passed together into the muzzle of a musket. The punishment is described as not more severe than that inflicted at English public schools. There is anotber flagellator, however, called the plete, a whip of twisted hide, which is still retained at a few of the most distant Siberian prisons and only for the most incorrigible, on whom irons, the birch, and other punishments have had no effect. The costliness of deportation is enormous and the results it obtains doubtful. The slow colonization of this vast territory may follow eventually, but there are already great difficulties in finding employment for the mass of labour in the Government’s bands. The mines of gold, silver, and coal are passing into private hands, and there are no other public works. Hence part of the Russian criminals who would have gone to Siberia are detained in the large prisons in Russia, where they are employed in manufactories or in the labours of ordinary mechanics, or any outdoor work such as making bricks, mending roads, and manufacturing salt. Nevertheless recent visit-ors to Russian prisons, whether in Russia proper or in the heart of Siberia, describe the prisoners as generally idle. The principle of progressive stages by which a prisoner can gain a remission of sen-tence or milder treatment prevails throughout. The well-conducted persons can earn wages, and may spend the money in buying an increase to their diet. The bulk of the Worst convicts gravitate to the island of Saghalien, where the number in 1879 was about 2600. Half of those were kept in prison, half remained comparatively free. The discipline here is very severe. The diet is said to be scanty, and as the island is barren everything has to be imported. Fish, how-ever, is found in large quantities. There are four large prisons at Dui, the principal post on the island, which are insufficiently heated in winter and generally overcrowded. The convicts are chiefly employed in raising coal from mines which are let to a company. Very conflicting evidence is current as regards the Siberian prisons. Prince Kropotkine, an exile, speaking with some authority, de-uounces them as hotbeds of vice and cruelty. Dr Lansdell on the other hand, a reputable eyewitness, does not on the whole speak unfavourably of them. He describes them as rough, perhaps; but so are Siberian dwellings. He thinks that as compared with the English convict the Siberian is not badly off. The labour is lighter; he has more privileges ; friends may see him oftener and bring him food ; and he passes his time neither in the seclusion of a cell nor in unbroken silence, but among his fellows with whom be may lounge, talk, and speak. The Russian convict, however, misses those intellectual, moral, and religious influences which are abun-dantly showered upon the English. There are no prisoners’ aid societies in Siberia, and the convict, after release, when suffered to begin life again on his own account, carries with him always the convict stain and is hindered rather than helped to begin life afresh. Dr Lansdell sums up his opinion in these words:—

"Taken at the worst, condemnation to the mines is not so bad as it seems; and, in the case of peasant exiles willing to work, I cannot but think that many of them have abetter chance of doing well in several parts of Siberia than at home in some parts of Russia. There Is reason to suppose that reports of the ill-treatment of Russian prisoners have been greatly exaggerated by careless, ill-informed, or malicious writers. No doubt some years ago there were good grounds for serious complaint. It is very evident that now the political prisoner, beyond exile, and temporary confinement in the jail, is not ill-used. He is not always subjected to the ordinary discipline of the criminal convict, nor is he obliged to associate with them. A fabulous story bas long been current that the worst criminals were buried alive in quicksilver mines, where they were speedily killed by the unhealthy fumes. There are no quicksilver mines in Siberia, and the principal mines, those of Nertchinsk, are now passing out of Government bands. These are mostly of silver, although other minerals and gems are found in the neigbbourbood. The hours of labour in the Nertchinsk mines were thirteen, and it was the same at the Kara gold mines. The convicts arrange their hours of work themselves. No definite amount of mineral was required, so they might work hard or not as they pleased. No doubt the lot of convicts In these mines was hard. Besides the laxity of discipline, the herding together of the worst characters and the deprivation of social, intellectual, and religious privileges must have made life a burden to many."

Spain, like Portugal, still lags behind. It is not to the credit of a country in which prison discipline was discussed three centuries ago that now at the close of the 19th its prison system is about the worst in Europe. Till very recently the posts of governors in the jails were sold to the highest bidder, and pur-chasers were suffered to recoup themselves out of the unfortunate wretches committed to their charge. The principal prison in the capital of the kingdom was nothing more than a converted slaughter house where pigs were killed and salted, as its name, the Saladero, implied. This dark, dirty, noisome den, although generally con-demned, continues to serve even now. Numerous efforts to provide a more suitable prison have been made from time to time. The construction of model prisons was decreed, as far back as 1847, but in 1860 nothing had been done, and a new project was brought forward. Again in 1869 a fresh scheme replaced the previous ones, which were still dead letters. Seven more years elapsed, and in 1876 a new law was passed providing for the construction of a new cellular prison in Madrid with cells for a thousand prisoners. This law too living fire, and the prison is not yet completed. The bulk of the prison population in Spain is still sent to presidios, or convict establishments, where general association both in the prison and at labour is the rule. The principal of these are situated at Cartagena, Valencia, where there are two prisons, Valladolid, Granada, and Burgos. There are also prisons at Alcala, Tarragona, Saragossa, and Santoña. Persons convicted of grave crimes are deported to the Balearic Islands or to the penal settlements in Africa, the principal of which are situated at Ceuta and Melilla. Throughout these establishments there is an utter absence of sanitary regulations; the diet is coarse and meagre ; the discipline is brutal ; the authorities are quite callous ; and morality does not exist. The Spanish authorities, however, claim the credit of having abolished corporal punishment in their prisons.

Sweden.—A great impetus was given to prison reform in Sweden by the interest taken in the question by King Oscar I. in 1840. Followill special legislation, thirty-eight new cellular prisons were built in the various provinces of the kingdom. These prisons have been used since for all prisoners awaiting trial, those condemned to reclusion and those sentenced to imprisonment with hard labour for two years and under. Persons sentenced to pay fines, but unable to pay, go to the cellular prisons. The isolation is continuous day and night. Besides these cellular there are a number of associated prisons for terms longer than two years and tip to life. The labour in the first-named is of the usual kind—tailoring, shoemaking, and some kinds of carpentry. Trade instructors are specially appointed, so as to provide a prisoner on liberation with some employment. In the associated prisons there is more variety of work: linen and woollen cloths are manufactured, timber split up for matches, granite cut and dressed for buildings and pavements. The female prisoners weave textile fabrics, and make match boxes. A portion of the earnings is granted to prisoners, which, to a limited extent, may be spent in buying extra food. There is no purely penal labour, nor any regulated system of granting remissions for industry or good conduct. Many aid societies were formed about twenty-five years ago, but through want of success or funds their number has dwindled down to two.

Switzerland.—From the complete independence of each canton, each has its own special penal system and places of imprisonment. Hence the systems are various, and are not all equally good. The prisons of Switzerland may be divided into four groups:—(1) those of the cantons of Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden, and Valais, which are still of a patriarchal character ; (2) those of Fribourg, Basel (rural), and Lucerne, which are on the associated plan and un-satisfactory from every point of view; (3) those of the cantons of St Gall, Vaud, Geneva, and Zurich, which have prisons for asso-ciated labour and separation at night, while Soleure, Grisons, Bern, and Schaffhausen are labouring to raise their prisons to this level; (5) the penitentiaries of Lenzburg, Basel (urban), Neuchâtel, and Ticino, which are good modern prisons in which the cellular system is completely applied. The system is one of progression, the pris-oner passes through several stages of isolation, employment in association, and comparative freedom ; but only at Neuchâtel is there separation by day as well as night. The general principle is one of collective imprisonment ; but there is an attempt at classifi-cation, according to degrees of morality, in the best prisons. Sen-tences may be either to imprisonment or reclusion wit hard labour. The first may be from twenty-four hours to five years ; the second from one year to fifteen, twenty, thirty years, or to life. An abbreviation of punishment may under all the cantonal laws be obtained, but such reduction is rarely made according to fixed rules, In most of the cantons prisoners have a share in their own labour. This labour is chiefly industrial, but there is a form of penal labour to be seen where the plan has survived of employing certain pris-oners to sweep the streets, make roads, or dyke the rivers. Such labour is felt to have a bad moral effect, and industrial labour is preferred. The latter is conducted by the administration itself, and not by contractors. It is thought that the state can introduce a greater variety of employments, and control the prisoner better when at labour than could free employers. Aid societies exist in most of the cantons ; the first was established at St Gall about 1845. Wherever they exist the societies protect prisoners in durance and assist prisoners on release by providing tools and employment with private persons. The only drawback in the Swiss aid societies is the want of organization and uniformity of action.

United States.—There is no uniform prison system in the United States. The variety of jurisdictions following the constant ex-tension of territory and development of communities more or less populous perpetuates changing conditions, and the supreme Govern-ment has not concerned itself greatly with prison affairs, and has claimed no supervision or special control. The rule of local self-government has left each jurisdiction to manage its prison according to its own ideas, and hence the utmost diversity of practice still obtains. While some prisons are as good as need be, others are marked with many defects. There is a wide distinction between the best and the worst. In the country which initiated prison reform, numbers of prisons exist nowadays which fall far below the commonest requirements of a good prison system. Taken broadly, the prisons of the Union may be classed into—(1) State prisons; (2) district prisons ; (3) county prisons ; (4) municipal or city prisons. Each State as a rule has its own State prison, but Pennsylvania and Indiana have two and New York three such prisons. The cellular system, or the rule of continuous separation, to which refer-ence has been made already (see p. 753), was at first followed by several States, but gradually abandoned in favour of the so-called silent system, or that of labour in association under the rule of silence, with cellular separation at night. At the present time there is but one prison, the Eastern Penitentiary of Philadelphia, managed on the purely solitary plan. Of the long-sentenced con-victs 96 per cent. are now confined in congregate prisons. There are about forty State prisons in all. Of the district prisons inter-mediate between the State and the county prisons there are but few. The county prisons are by far the most numerous. The countv in the United States is the unit of political organization under the State, and, with area and population comparatively limited, is a convenient subdivison for the purposes of the criminal law, Hence it has been asserted that no one knows exactly the number of county prisons in the United States, but it has been computed at upwards of two thousand. The city or municipal prisons are also very numerous and constantly increasing. Each and every one, as in the State prisons, is managed locally by local authorities, with the inevitable result of the utmost diversity in practice, and often enough the utmost neglect of the commonest rules of prison dis-cipline. A self-constituted body inspected a couple of hundred of these jails a few years back, and reported that they were mostly defective from a sanitary point of view, insecure, and so constructed as to compel the promiscuous association of all classes old and young, the guilty and innocent, the novice and the hardened in crime. The sexes even were not invariably separated. Little or no employment was provided for the prisoners, and in few prisons was any effort made to compass religious or intellectual culture. An eye-witness, Dr Wines, reporting of other jails of the same class still more recently, unliesitatingly condemned them. "Ohio, to-day," says the Ohio Board of Charity, "supports base seminaries of crime at public expense." "In our jail system lingers more barbarism than in all our other State institutions together." Yet there are a few and conspicuous exceptions to the general verdict of condemna-tion. The discipline and management of the district prisons at Albany, Detroit, Rochester, and Pittsburgh are excellent. The good example is gradually becoming more and more largely imitated here good prisons exist it will be found that their administration remains for some length of time in intelligent hands, free from the "pernicious influence of partisan politics." The chief drawback to improvement is the uncertainty no less than the complexity of the governing bodies. These are apt to be changed capriciously ; and, what is worse, they are needlessly intricate and often far too numer-ous. They act independently, without reference to each other, and they are not too ready to benefit by example and experience. What is wanted is a supreme central authority over all the prisons of a State, if not throughout the Union. Wherever there is the nearest approach to this the results are most satisfactory.

It is not strange that under these conditions discipline should also vary greatly, or, as has been said, "every variety of discipline, lack of discipline, or abuse of discipline is found." Neither the deterrent nor the reformatory agencies are properly or uniformly brought to bear. Prison punishments are still severe; although flog-ging is nominally abolished, it is said to be still practised in prisons where it is forbidden ; and some more ancient methods such as the yoke, the shower bath, and the iron crown have not yet entirely disappeared. There is, however, often good secular and religious instruction. The dietaries are fuller than oil the opposite side of the Atlantic, meat is a more common ingredient, and Indian meal is very largely issued. The financial results obtained are not un-satisfactory: many of the State prisons are now self-supporting, and an examination of the labour returns will prove that much enter-prise has been displayed in finding employment for the prisoners. There is no purely penal labour, although much of the labour performed is sufficiently severe. There may be no treadwheel or cranks, but convicts in Alabama and Texas have been employed to build railways ; they have raised cotton in Mississippi, and have worked mines in Tennessee and New York, while in many States they are utilized in gardening and agriculture. A great deal of labour has been expended on quarrying and dressing stone for building, or for burning into quicklime; at Auburn there is a large manufactory of agricultural tools ; Ohio employs saddlers ; Massa-chusetts prisoners make ornamental iron work; in Michigan they tan leather ; and at Dannemora, in northern New York, iron ore is quarried, smelted, forged, and wrought into nails by the prisoners.

In general the labour is hired by contractors at a fixed sum per day, which varies from a few cents to as much as a dollar. The chief cause for the present inadequacy of the American prisons, over and above the faults in administration already mentioned, is probably the rapidly increased demand on their accommodation in recent years. This is due partly to the growth of population, partly also to the influx of "coloured" criminals since the emancipation. In the days of slavery the slave was punished summarily by his master, but now he is arraigned and sent to prison. The result has been that the prisons were suddenly crowded before any new and improved system could be introduced.

While there are but few agencies for the assistance of discharged prisoners, considerable care is devoted in the United States to the treatment and checking of juvenile crime. Reformatories have existed since 1825, when the first was established on Randall’s Island within the limits of the city of New York. Others followed; but these did not form part of the penal system of the States till 1847, when the State reform school at Westborough was established by law. They soon increased and multiplied, and now between sixteen and twenty are to be found within the principal States. There are also a number of semi-public schools. The average reformatory population is about 15, 000. The results are said to be very satisfactory. The percentage of youths reformed and trained into good citizens has been placed as high as 60, 75, even 80 per cent. Parents may in some States contribute to the support of their children in reformatories, but as a rule the inmates are orphans or abandoned children or those whose parents are very poor. The best system for training and caring for juvenile offerlders probably is that which obtains in Massachusetts. (A. G.)


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The above article was written by: Major Arthur George Frederick Griffiths; H.M. Inspector of Prisons, 1878-96; formerly editor of Army and Navy Gazette; editor of the Fortnightly Review, 1884, the World, 1895; author of Memorials of Millbank, Secrets of the Prison House, and Histories of Police and Crime.