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Memoir of the late J. Neild, Esq.

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mad, and that my impertinent curiosity planned and the best regulated prison I would perhaps send us both to prison: had seen before, or, I think, since. It is aiter this reproof I was silent on the situated near a canal; the plan octagon; subject. He however accompanied me separate courts for men vagrants and to many of the hospitals, which appeared men criminals: one side is for women, to be affectionately attended by some and in the middle of their court is a bafemale religious order: and this I ob- son of water for washing the linen of the served in the provincial gaols, which in house; and a large wooden horse, to my several visits to France I visited. ride by way of punishment; their bedOn my return home I found I had lost rooms uniform, and in a range, somea diamond ring, in the place of which thing like Chelsea Hospital; every range some sharpers had substituted one of paste.

opens into a gallery or lobby, which is open to the air of the court: the prisoner Fresh imported from Paris, from has an uniform clothing, with the number whence I had brought many curious ar- of his room. The work-rooms are on ticles, my shop soon became visited by the ground floor, and there were more carriages, and I found my business in- than 100 prisoners, with only one person crease beyond my capital; but I found to superintend them; he was at one end no difficulty in borrowing 500l.; which, of the room, with a desk before him, and with the frugal management of my aunt a large book, in which were entered the in my household concerns, soon opened names of the prisoners, the crimes for flattering prospects. In 1772 a sermon which they were committed, the time of was preached, on behalf of persons im- imprisonment, from one to twenty years, prisoned for small debts, at which I was according to their crimes; the day the present. A general approbation the work was begun, the day it was finished, idea was declared, and a few of us the measure of the piece, the task due formed ourselves into a committee, and per day, observations, such as sick, visited the prisons to search out proper lame, &c. &c. and deficiency of task, objects. The distress and extreme punishment, &c. &c. &c. Though this wretchedness to which we were eye-wit- room was so crowded, not a word was nesses, determined us to lay an account spoken by any of the prisoners during before the publick, who instantly caught the time we inspected it; no noise or the flame, and enabled us to reach out confusion, all were silent and attentive the hand of pity to a very large number to their work; in short, it appeared a of miserable sufferers in confinement.

most noble institution. A few years afIn May 1773, the Society for the ter, being at Ghent, I think in 1784, Relief and Discharge of persons impri- having no acquaintance there, I could soned for Small Debts, was instituted or not gain admission; but was told the formed; and, in 1774, I was unani- manufactory was destroyed, and the mously elected the Treasurer. At this whole in a very bad state. At Bruges time I visited some of the prisons in and the prison is on a much smaller scale; about the metropolis, and reported upon some were employed in making cloaths, them every week. The finances of our and others in making saddles, bridles. Society increased, and my visits and in- &c. &c. for the army. In 1780 I had quiries extended; so that in a few years the honour of the King's commnission in I had travelled over a very considerable a corps of volunteer infantry, in which I part of the kingdom. was actively employed, till there was no In 1778 I married the eldest daughter further occasion for our services. Iu of John Camden, of Battersea, esq. by 1781 I visited Warwick Gaol, and in the whom I had two sons and a daughter. dungeons caught the gaol fever or disIn 1779 I went through Flanders temper. Mr. Roe, the keeper, was too into Germany, and getting acquainted ill to accompany me, and sent his turnwith Col. (afterwards Gen.) Dalton, I key. Roe's death was, I believe, accewas, through his interest, permitted to lerated by drinking. When I found visit La Maison de Force, at Ghent. myself sick, which was almost inmeThis was, without exception, the best diately, I took a post chaise to Stratford,

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Memoir of the late J. Neild, Esq.

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where I arrived just as the coach was 427 persons confined to this wretched setting out to London. I got into it, state of captivity. Lord Romney, as and soon reached St. James's-street. President of our Society, did me the I did not, however, recover for some honour of presenting this book to the time. This sickness, and my young King, and his Majesty was pleased most family, made me more cautious of enter- graciously to receive it. The approbaing dungeons, which had now become tion with which it was honoured by the less necessary, from the labours of the public, together with the very consiimmortal Howard, whose visits and in- derable benefactions to the Society for quiries comprehended every class of pri- Relief of Persons imprisoned for Small soners, whilst mine were particularly directed to the debtors.

I did not wholly abstain from making remarks on felons, particularly in the dungeons of the two prisons at Chester and Liverpool.

The acts which passed in consequence of the benevolent Howard's Reports, produced an immediate and general reform in prison police, by the abolition of taps. Several new gaols were built, in which solitary cells supplied the place of dungeons; and, in many prisons, women were not loaded with irons, From this period to 1791 my visits were less frequent, and extended to the country, as business would permit.

Debts in consequence of it, induced me to publish a new and more copious edition, in 1802, and likewise extend my visits to Scotland and Wales.

As I kept a diary, so I wrote to my benevolent friend Dr. Lettsom, an account of the most striking occurrences; and to his suggestions alone the publishing my prison remarks owe their origin. It had been my constant practice, in my various prison excursions during a period of 30 years, to wait upon the magistrates, particularly of cities and boroughs, and respectfully to represent what I saw amiss in their gaols. I was always received with cordiality and kindness; and, as they were struck This year I lost a most amiable wife, with compassion at the recital, reform my own health was rapidly on the de- was determined upon, and resolutions cline, and my business increased beyond entered into; but, after a lapse of eight my abilities or power to manage. In or ten years, guess my surprize, when 1792, having only two sons to provide I found nothing done! So total and for, I retired from business with a very general a neglect must be produced by I inquired into it, and ample fortune; and, as my health be- some cause. came restored, recommenced my prison found many who were magistrates, from visits and inquiries, reports of which local situations, and before they were (as far as related to debtors) I made reacquainted with its duties, were out of gularly, at the meetings of the commit- the commission; others, whose active tee, in Craven-street. In 1800, when situations in commerce denied them the excessive dearness of provisions, and time; some, who had large families, the difficulties of the poorer classes of were afraid to venture inside of the pri. the people required an extraordinary re-son; and many were numbered with lief, the necessity of a general visit and the dead. Under these discouraging inquiry into the state of all the gaols when Providence raised up a man, by circumstances I had almost despaired, struck me very forcibly.

I set about it immediately, and in whose labour the cloud was dispelled. and that life, hitherto spent uselessly, 1801* published my first Account of became fruitful. If Howard owed any Debtors, by which it appeared there were 39 prisons in England and Wales thing to Fothergill, I am in a ten-fold which did not furnish the debtor with degree indebted to Dr. John Coakley any allowance whatever; and in these Lettsom. He first suggested, nay, rethere were, in the month of April 1800, quested permission to publish some of those crude remarks, which I had sent

The two-penny loaf in London, August for his perusal, and by which commu1783, weighed 21 ounces. In March 1801, the nication I had found a sensible relief: two-penny loaf in London weighed only six they were begun and continued without

ounces.

Varieties: Critical, Literary, and Historical.

[656

design; written in the hours of fatigue, [The Memoir here terminates, but lassitude, sickness, and the bustle of not so the benevolent labours of Mr. inns; little calculated to appear before Neild. His health did not, however, the publick, except in matters of fact. These remarks on prisons were in- tended; but he continued to inspect allow him to visit Ireland as he introduced with a preface, which ca sed the various prisons of England, Scota general sensation, and brought a de- land, and Wales, and to suggest numegree of celebrity on the Visitor of Pri- rous improvements, both in regard to sons he neither desired or deserved; the construction of the wards, and the whilst it enriched his funds as Treasurer internal management of these establishto the Society for Small Debts, in the ments. In 1812 he published the "State sum of 3281. 2s. 9d. evidently occasioned of Prisons," above alluded to, in a large by the reading the Gentleman's Maga- and very elegant 4to volume, with a zine, in which they were inserted. teeming with valuable information. portrait of the author. It is a Work

surer of the Society for Small Debts, un-
He continued his exertions, as Trea-
til the time of his Death, which took
place Feb. 16, in the year 1814.
April 1817.

T. J. PETTIGREW.

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The benevolence of my friend did not rest here; for, as he was no stranger to the inside of the prison-house, so did he frequently accompany me to those abodes of guilt and misery, and suggest what his professional skill so well enabled him to do, to my great advantage, and the prisoners' comforts. Many new gaols are now (1806) buildON JAMES NEILD, Esq. LLD. ing; and, from the alterations and im- Hence the true Christian, lord of Appetite, By Miss PORTER. provements which have been making The conqueror of low but fierce resentments these four years, and are now daily making, the particulars of which my "State of Prisons' will notice, my visits will become less necessary. As soon as this Work is published, and I can provide for my necessary absence, I pose visiting Ireland; and happy will the short remaining period of my life be spent, if I can suggest to a brave and generous people, any improvements in their prison police, and of which I am informed there is much need.

pro

Which in a painful fever keep the soul
Free from impediments, pursues with ardour
All that adorns and meliorates the man ;
That polishes our life, or soothes its ills.
Points to the squalid cottage of Affliction,
Where'er Compassion with her glist’oing eye
Jews, Moors, and Infidels,are all his Brethren.

Could he, in some remote and barbarous land,
He'd traverse wilds or swelling seas to court
By powerful gold, or salutary arts,
The god-like office; his expanded heart
Make pale Distress give way to blooming Jey,
In every climate feels himself at home.

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MERRY ANDREW.

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ILLUSTRATION OF PROVERBS, &c. tertainment, these noble guests were conducted to a sumptuous bed-chamber, by Formerly every itinerant quack doc- the Prince Tiberius and the beautiful tor, who made a practice of haranguing Princess Jacqueline. Thirteen pompous the people at fairs and markets, was at beds ornamented the vast apartment; tended by a buffoon, dressed in a motley that in the middle was for Charlemagne, garb, and whose business lay in playing who, being in no humour for sleeping, tricks for the amusement of the specta- proposed to amuse himself and his tors, while his master cheated them out twelve companions by a species of conof their money. The servant was inva- versation, which the author of the roriably named Merry Andrew;" but it mance call "Gaber," and which conis singular enough that the original An- sisted in making the most ridiculous rhodrew was the doctor himself, being no domontades. He began with vaunting Jess a man than Andrew Borde, a native that, with his good sword Joyeuse, he of Pevensey in Sussex, and bred at Ox- could cut a man in twain, although deford, where he took a degree and then fended by the best tempered armour. beca be a Carthusian in London: but Orlando, his nephew, professed, that by disliking the severity of that order, he one blast of his horn he would level with quitted it, and studied physic, for which the ground fifty fathom of the walls of purpose, and being of a rambling dispo- Constantinople. Ogier, the Dane, unsition, he travelled over the greatest part dertook to overturn the edifice in which of Europe, and even into Africa. On they had been entertained, merely by his return he settled first at Winchester, tying a cord round the centre pillar of but in 1541 he went to Montpelier, the hall, and exerting his force in pulling where he took his doctor's degree, which at it. In short, every peer had his pewas confirmed to him afterwards by the culiar boast, and that of the Marquis University of Oxford. The practice Oliver was the only one which distinof Andrew Borde, notwithstanding his guished itself from the rest; but, uneducation and the honour which he en- luckily, from its ludicrous nature, even joyed of being physician to Henry the it cannot be repeated. The "Gabs" Eighth, ill became the gravity of his being completed, the party composed profession; for it was his custom to themselves to sleep, with a calmness of travel about from town to town, enter mind which they would hardly have taining the populace in public with possessed, had they known what was to witty stories, while he administered to befal them the next morning. For it their complaints. On this account he chanced, that the Emperor Hugo, who obtained the name of " Merry Andrew," had expected that from the conversation and when he died, several empirics of thirteen such paragons of valour and arose, who, having neither his knowl- wisdom he should gain documents of edge nor his humour, endeavoured to importance towards the good governmake up for both by hiring some lively ment of his empire, had placed a spy, and agile fellows, whose business it was concealed in a hollow column, who was to play tricks and put the crowd into good humour.-New Mon, Mag,

ROMANCES.

directed to note every word which passed, and to report it in the morning. There is a romance little known, en commission faithfully; and having, by The person appointed executed his titled “Galienus restored," which, from means of a private stair-case, acquainted the specimen which an ingenious French Hugo with the whole conversation, be writer gives of it, must probably be very was so much disappointed to find, in the. interesting. The account of a visit, room of the maxims which he expected, which, the author says, Charlemagne a pack of improbable lies, that, forgetful and his twelve peers paid to an Emperor of the laws which hospitality enjoins, he Hugo, at Constantinople, and the recep- sent word to the whole party, by a her tion which that prince gave to them, is, as the same writer expresses it, des plus grand naivetez qu'on ait jamais ecrites." After a magnificent en

"Une

From "Gaber," it is supposed, is derived "The gift of a Gab," which has much the same sense as is mentioned above. Gab, or Gob, is used in the North to signify mouth.

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ald, that unless they performed each ing remarkable for beauty or youth, yet man his "gab," completely and without few women live happier in the conjugal deceit, he had taken a solemn oath to state, as the heartiness, the sincerity, and hang up every one of them, not except- the general good hour (not to mening the venerable Charlemagne himself. tion the frequent absences) of their mates, It is certain that nothing but a very bit- make ample amends for those small deter aversion to liars could have driven ficiencies, as to delicacy or politeness, the good prince to this hasty measure, which they sometimes might complain of. since he was obliged, in the execution of Two of the brightest points in the it, to expose the honour of his family in character of a seaman seem to be, ina very delicate point. The remainder of trepidity and presence of mind. Withthe story is somewhat too long, rather out partiality we may say, that it is in too profane, and much too free, for this the British mariner particularly that these work: wherefore those who wish to qualities are to be observed. In the know how Charlemagne and his peers hour of extreme danger, he does not, were extricated from the scrape must like the Portuguese, the Italian, or the consult Menage, who will inform them Russ, either ask assistance from, or deof the unprecedented condescension and nounce vengeance against his patron humanity of the fair Princess Jacqueline, saint. No, he trusts to his own agility and of the very indifferent figure which and resolution for safety; and if he ima celestial messenger made by under- precates curses on any head, it is on his taking a business quite out of his line.

SAILORS.

own, or on that of some lubber who is not as active as himself in the general work of preservation.

The race of sailors are so truly eccentric, that notwithstanding the numberless Superstition and profaneness, those anecdotes with which they supply con- extremes of human conduct, are too of versation, there are many interesting cir- ten found united in the sailor; and the cumstances relative to their very peculiar man who dreads the stormy effects of character yet left untold. Like other drowning a cat, or of whistling a counarts, that of navigation possesses a num- try-dance, while he leans over the gunber of technical terms peculiar to itself. wale, will too often wantonly defy his The sailor forms these into a language, Creator by the most daring execrations and introduces them, without hesitation, and the most licentious behaviour. into all companies, on all occasions, and, most assuredly he is thoughtless of the generally, with brilliant success, as nau- fault he commits, and (like the poor* tical expressions are pointed, humorous, fellow who spied land, after many days and easily adapted to the situations of intolerable sufferings of hunger and thirst common life.

Inured to hardships, to dangers, and to a perpetual change of companions, the seaman contracts a species of stoicism which might raise the envy even of a Diogenes." Avast there!" cried a sailor to his comrade, who was busied in heaving overboard the lower division of a messmate just cut in halves by a chainshot, "Avast! let us first see if he has not got the key of our mess-chest in his pocket!"

But

in the boat of the shipwrecked Centaur) thinks that he is at liberty to express his gratitude, or his distress, by the method which to him appears most apt and most expressive.

But the sailor's character must not be dismissed, without some notice being taken of that fraternal regard which reigns among them all, let the outsides of some be ever so rugged. No tie of freemasonry, no eath, no bond of society, can unite any denomination of manAs their enjoyments are simple and kind together as sailors are united. It few, sailors are equally at home at Port is in the most trying situations of life Royal, Halifax, Canton, Cape Coast that the effects of this union are most Castle, or the Point at Portsmouth. scen. If a sea-officer dies, leaving a

From the admiral to the cabin-boy, family behind him unprovided for, his their attachment to the fair-sex is earnest, sons become the children of his fraterlasting, and almost indiscriminate. The

wives of seafaring men are far from be

*See "Captain Inglefield's Narrative,"

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