(September, 1818.)

An Inquiry whether Crime and Misery are produced or prevented by our present System of Pris Discipline. Illustrated by Descriptions of the Borough Compter, Tothill Fields Prison, the Jail at St. Albans, the Jail at Guildford, the Jail at Bristol, the Jails at Bury and Ilchester, the Maison de Force at Ghent, the Philadelphia Prison, the Penitentiary at Millbank, and the Proceedings of the Ladies' Committee at Newgate. By THOMAS FOWELL BUXTON. 8vo. p. 171. London: 1818.

administration into the hands of the victors, | paign. The intentors of the steam-engine and the spinning-machine have, beyond all question, done much more in our own times, not only to increase the comforts and wealth of their country, but to multiply its resources and enlarge its power, than all the Statesmen and Warriors who have affected during the same period, to direct its destiny; and yet, while the incense of public acclamation has been lavished upon the latter-while wealth and honours, and hereditary distinctions, have been heaped upon them in their lives, and monumental glories been devised to perpetuate the remembrance of their services, the former have been left undistinguished in the crowd of ordinary citizens, and permitted to close their days, unvisited by any ray of public favour or national gratitude,-for no other reason that can possibly be suggested, than that their invaluable services were performed without noise or contention, in the studious privacy of benevolent meditation, and without any of those tumultuous accompaniments that excite the imagination, or inflame the passions of observant multitudes.

and thus to enable them not only to engross the credit of carrying through all those beneficial arrangements that may be called for by the voice of the country, but to carry them through in their own way, we ought not perhaps to wonder, that in the eagerness of this pursuit, which is truly that of the means to all ends, some of the ends themselves should, when separately presented, appear of inferior moment, and excite far less interest or concern. But, though this apology may be available in some degree to the actors, it still leaves us at a loss to account for the corresponding sentiments that are found in the body of the people, who are but lookers on for the most part in this great scene of contention-and can scarcely fail to perceive, one would imagine, that their immediate interests were often postponed to the mere gladiatorship of the parties, and their actual service neglected, while this fierce strife was maintained as to who should be allowed to serve them. In such circumstances, we should naturally expect to find, that the popular favourites would not be the leaders of the opposite political parties, but The case, however, is precisely the same those who, without regard to party, came for- with the different classes of those who occupy ward to suggest and promote measures of ad- themselves with public interests. He who mitted utility-and laboured directly to en- thunders in popular assemblies, and consumes large the enjoyments and advantages of the his antagonists in the blaze of his patriotic people, or to alleviate the pressure of their eloquence, or withers them with the flash of necessary sufferings. That it is not so in fact his resistless sarcasm, immediately becomes, and reality, must be ascribed, we think, partly not merely a leader in the senate, but an idol to the sympathy which, in a country like this, in the country at large;-while he who by men of all conditions take in the party feel- his sagacity discovers, by his eloquence recomings of their political favourites, and the sense mends, and by his laborious perseverance ultithey have of the great importance of their mately effects, some great improvement in success, and the general prevalence of their the condition of large classes of the commuprinciples; and partly, no doubt, and in a nity, is rated, by that ungrateful community, greater degree, to that less justifiable but very as a far inferior personage; and obtains, for familiar principle of our nature, by which we his nights and days of successful toil, a far are led, on so many other occasions, to prefer less share even of the cheap reward of popu splendid accomplishments to useful qualities, lar applause than is earned by the other, and to take a much greater interest in those merely in following the impulses of his own perilous and eventful encounters, where the ambitious nature. No man in this country prowess of the champions is almost all that is ever rose to a high political station, or even to be proved by the result, than in those hum- obtained any great personal power and influbler labours of love or wisdom, by which the ence in society, merely by originating in Parenjoyments of the whole society are multi-liament measures of internal regulation, or plied or secured. conducting with judgment and success imThere is a reason, no doubt, for this also-provements, however extensive, that did not and a wise one-as for every other general law to which its great Author has subjected our being: But it is not the less true, that it often operates irregularly, and beyond its province, as may be seen in the familiar instance of the excessive and pernicious admiration which follows all great achievements in War, and makes Military fame so dangerously seducing, both to those who give and to those who receive it. It is undeniably true, as Swift said long ago, that he who made two blades of grass to grow where one only grew before, was a greater benefactor to his country than all the heroes and conquerors with whom its annals are emblazed; and yet it would be ludicrous to compare the fame of the most successful improver in agriculture with that of the most inconsiderable soldier who ever signalised his courage in an unsuccessful cam

affect the interests of one or other of the two great parties in the state. Mr. Wilberforce may perhaps be mentioned as an exception, and certainly the greatness, the long endu rance, and the difficulty of the struggle, which he at last conducted to so glorious a termination, have given him a fame and popularity which may be compared, in some respects, with that of a party leader. But even Mr. Wilberforce would be at once demolished in a contest with the leaders of party; and could do nothing, out of doors, by his own individua. exertions; while it is quite manifest, that the greatest and most meritorious exertions to ex tend the reign of Justice by the correction of our civil code-to ameliorate the condition of the Poor-to alleviate the sufferings of the Prisoner,-or, finally, to regenerate the minds of the whole people by an improved system

of Education, will never give a man half the power or celebrity that may be secured, at any time, by a brilliant speech on a motion of censure, or a flaming harangue on the boundlessness of our resources, and the glories of our arms.

tails of a painful and offensive nature; and as indolent sort of optimism, by which we natu rally seek to excuse our want of activity, b charitably presuming that things are as wel as they can easily be made, and that it is inconceivable that any very flagrant abuses should be permitted by the worthy and humane people who are more immediately con cerned in their prevention. To this is added a fear of giving offence to those same worthy visitors and superintendants-and a still more potent fear of giving offence to his Majesty's Government;-for though no administration can really have any interest in the existence of such abuses, or can be suspected of wish ing to perpetuate them from any love for them or their authors, yet it is but too true that most long-established administrations have looked with an evil eye upon the detectors and redressors of all sorts of abuses, however little connected with politics or political persons— first, because they feel that their long and undisturbed continuance is a tacit reproach on their negligence and inactivity, in not having made use of their great opportunities to dis cover and correct them― secondly, because all such corrections are innovations upon of usages and establishments, and practical ad missions of the flagrant imperfection of those boasted institutions, towards which it is ther interest to maintain a blind and indiscriminate veneration in the body of the people-and. thirdly, because, if general abuses affecting

It may be conjectured already, that with all due sense of the value of party distinctions, and all possible veneration for the talents which they call most prominently into action, we are inclined to think, that this estimate of public services might be advantageously corrected; and that the objects which would exclusively occupy our statesmen if they were all of one mind upon constitutional questions, ought more frequently to take precedence of the contentions to which those questions give rise. We think there is, of late, a tendency to such a change in public opinion. The nation, at least, seems at length heartily sick of those heroic vapourings about our efforts for the salvation of Europe,-which seem to have ended in the restoration of old abuses abroad, and the imposition of new taxes at home; and about the vigour which was required for the maintenance of our glorious constitution, which has most conspicuously displayed itself in the suspension of its best bulwarks, and the organisation of spy systems and vindictive persecutions, after the worst fashion of arbitrary governments;-and seems disposed to require, at the hands of its representatives, some substantial pledge of their concern for the general welfare, by an active and zealous co-large classes of the community are allowed to operation in the correction of admitted abuses, and the redress of confessed wrongs.

It is mortifying to the pride of human wisdom, to consider how much evil has resulted from the best and least exceptionable of its boasted institutions-and how those establishments that have been most carefully devised for the repression of guilt, or the relief of misery, have become themselves the fruitful and pestilent sources both of guilt and misery, in a frightful and disgusting degree. Laws, without which society could not exist, become, by their very multiplication and refinement, a snare and a burden to those they were intended to protect, and let in upon us the hateful and most intolerable plagues, of pettifogging, chicanery, and legal persecution. Institutions for the relief and prevention of Poverty have the effect of multiplying it tenfold-hospitals for the cure of Diseases become centres of infection. The very Police, which is necessary to make our cities habitable, give birth to the odious vermin of informers, thief-catchers, and suborners of treachery; -and our Prisons, which are meant chiefly to reform the guilty and secure the suspected, are converted into schools of the most atrocious corruption, and dens of the most inhuman torture.

Those evils and abuses, thus arising out of intended benefits and remedies, are the last to which the attention of ordinary men is directed-because they arise in such unexpected quarters, and are apt to be regarded as the unavoidable accompaniments of indispensable institutions. There is a selfish delicacy which makes us at all times averse to enter into de

be exposed and reformed in any one depart ment, the people might get accustomed to look for the redress of all similar abuses in other departments,-and reform would cease to be a word of terror and alarm (as most ministers think it ought to be) to all loyal subjects.

These, no doubt, are formidable obstacles; and therefore it is, that gross abuses have been allowed to subsist so long. But they are so far from being insurmountable, that we are perfectly persuaded that nothing more is necessary to insure the effectual correction, or mitigation at least, of all the evils to which we have alluded, than to satisfy the public, 1st, of their existence and extent-and, 2dl~, of there being means for their effectual redress and prevention. Evils that are directly con nected with the power of the existing admin istration-abuses of which they are themselves the authors or abettors, or of which they have the benefit, can only be corrected by their removal from office-and are substantially irremediable, however enormous, while they continue in power. All questions as to them, therefore, belong to the department of party politics, and fall within the province of the polemical statesman. But with regard to all other plain violations of reason, justice, of humanity, it is comfortable to think that we live in such a stage of society as to make it impossible that they should be allowed to sub sist many years, after their mischief and in• quity have been made manifest to the sense of the country at large. Public opinion, which is still potent and formidable even to Ministe rial corruption, is omnipotent against ali mie

rior malversations-and the invaluable means | False accusation; and to condemn him who of denunciation and authoritative and irresis-is only suspected, is to commence his punishtible investigation whicl. we possess in our ment while his crime is uncertain. Nay, it is representative legislature, puts it in the power not only uncertain, as to all who are untried, of any man of prudence, patience, and re- but it is the fixed presumption of the law that spectability in that House, to bring to light the the suspicion is unfounded, and that a trial most secret, and to shame the most arrogant will establish his innocence. We suppose delinquent, and to call down the steady ven- there are not less than ten or fifteen thousand geance of public execration, and the sure persons taken up yearly in Great Britain and light of public intelligence, for the repression Ireland on suspicion of crimes, of whom cerand redress of all public injustice. tainly there are not two-thirds convicted; so that, in all likelihood, there are not fewer than seven or eight thousand innocent persons placed

very imprisonment, though an unavoidable, is beyond all dispute a very lamentable evil; and to which no unnecessary addition can be made without the most tremendous injustice.

The charm is in the little word PUBLICITY! And it is cheering to think how many wonders have already been wrought by that pre-annually in this painful predicament-whose cious Talisman. If the House of Commons was of no other use but as an organ for proclaiming and inquiring into all alleged abuses, and making public the results, under the sanction of names and numbers which no man The debtor, again, seems entitled to at dares to suspect of unfairness or inattention, least as much indulgence. "He may," says it would be enough to place the country in Mr. Buxton, "have been reduced to his inawhich it existed far above all terms of com- bility to satisfy his creditor by the visitation parison with any other, ancient or modern, in of God, by disease, by personal accidents, which no such institution had been devised. by the failure of reasonable projects, by the Though the great work is done, however, by largeness or the helplessness of his family. that House and its committees-though it is His substance, and the substance of his credi there only that the mischief can be denounced tor, may have perished together in the flames, with a voice that reaches to the utmost bor- or in the waters. Human foresight cannot ders of the land-and there only that the seal always avert, and human industry cannot al of unquestioned and unquestionable authority ways repair, the calamities to which our na can be set to the statements which it authen- ture is subjected;-surely, then, some debtors ticates and gives out to the world;-there is are entitled to compassion."-(p. 4.) Of the still room, and need too, for the humbler min-number of debtors at any one time in confineistry of inferior agents, to circulate and enforce, to repeat and expound, the momentous facts that have been thus collected, and upon which the public must ultimately decide. It is this unambitious, but useful function that we now propose to perform, in laying before our readers a short view of the very interesting facts which are detailed in the valuable work of which the title is prefixed, and in the parliamentary papers to which it refers.

Prisons are employed for the confinement and security of at least three different descriptions of persons:-first, of those who are accused of crimes and offences, but have not yet been brought to trial; 2d, of those who have been convicted, and are imprisoned preparatory to, or as a part of, their punishment; and 3d, of debtors, who are neither convicted nor accused of any crime whatsoever. In both the first classes, and even in that least entitled to favour, there is room for an infinity of distinctions-from the case of the boy arraigned or convicted for a slight assault or a breach of the peace, up to that of the bloody murderer or hardened depredator, or veteran leader of the house-breaking gang. All these persons must indeed be imprisoned-for so the law has declared; but, under that sentence, we humbly conceive there is no warrant to inflict on them any other punishment-any thing more than a restraint on their personal freedom. This, we think, is strictly true of all the three classes we have mentioned; but it will scarcely be disputed, at all events, that it is true of the first and the last. A man may avail the penalties of Crime, by avoiding all erirainality: But no man can be secure against

ment in these kingdoms, we have no means of forming a conjecture; but beyond all doubt they amount to many thousands, of whom probably one half have been reduced to that state by venial errors, or innocent misfortune.

Even with regard to the convicted, we humbly conceive it to be clear, that where no special severity is enjoined by the law, any additional infliction beyond that of mere coercion, is illegal. If the greater delinquents alone were subjected to such severities, there might be a colour of equity in the practice; but, in point of fact, they are inflicted according to the state of the prison, the usage of the place, or the temper of the jailor;and, in all cases, they are inflicted indiscriminately on the whole inmates of each unhappy mansion. Even if it were otherwise, "Who, says Mr. B., "is to apportion this variety of wretchedness? The Judge, who knows noth ing of the interior of the jail; or the jailor, who knows nothing of the transactions of the Court? The law can easily suit its penalties to the circumstances of the case. It can ad judge to one offender imprisonment for one day; to another for twenty years: But what ingenuity would be sufficient to devise, and what discretion could be trusted to inflict, modes of imprisonment with similar varia tions ?"—p. 8.

But the truth is, that all inflictions be rond that of mere detention, are clearly illegal.-Take the common case of fetters - from Bracton down to Blackstone, all our lawyers declare the use of them to be contrary to law. The last says, in so many words, that "the law will not justify jailors in fettering a pri

soner, unless where he is unruly or has at- | mitted, that in that quarter some alteratio tempted an escape;" and, even in that case, the practice seems to be questionable-if we can trust to the memorable reply of Lord Chief Justice King to certain magistrates, who urged their necessity for safe custody "let them build their walls higher." Yet has this matter been left, all over the kingdom, as a thing altogether indifferent, to the pleasure of the jailor or local magistrates; and the practice accordingly has been the most capricious and irregular that can well be imagined.

"In Chelmsford, for example, and in Newgate, all accused or convicted of felony are ironed.-At Bury, and at Norwich, all are without irons.-At Abingdon the untried are not ironed.-At Derby, none but the untried are ironed!-At Cold-bath fields, none but the untried, and those sent for reexamination, are ironed.-At Winchester, all before trial are ironed; and those sentenced to transportation after trial.-At Chester, those alone of bad character are ironed, whether tried or untried." pp. 68, 69. But these are trifles. The truth of the case is forcibly and briefly stated in the following short sentences:

might be desirable, though, in his apprenEEsion, it was altogether impracticable. Tous by no means inclined to adopt the whole of the worthy Alderman's opinions, we may safely say, that we should have been mod disposed to agree with him in thinking the subjects of those observations pretty neary incorrigible; and certainly should not have hesitated to pronounce the change which bat actually been made upon them altogether in possible. Mrs. Fry, however, knew better of what both she and they were capable; and, strong in the spirit of compassionate love, and of that charity that hopeth all things, and be lieveth, all things, set herself earnestly and humbly to that arduous and revolting task. which her endeavours have been so singulady blessed and effectual. This heroic and atectionate woman is the wife, we understars, of a respectable banker in London; and both she and her husband belong to the Society of Friends-that exemplary sect, which is the first to begin and the last to abandon every scheme for the practical amendment of their fellow-creatures-and who have carried into

"You have no right to deprive a man sentenced all their schemes of reformation a spirit of to mere imprisonment of pure air, wholesome and practical wisdom, of magnanimous patience. sufficient food, and opportunities of exercise. You and merciful indulgence, which puts to shame have no right to debar him from the craft on which the rashness, harshness, and precipitation of his family depends, if it can be exercised in prison. sapient ministers, and presumptuous port You have no right to subject him to suffering from cians. We should like to lay the whole accold, by want of bed-clothing by night, or firing by count of her splendid campaign before our day. And the reason is plain, you have taken him from his home, and have deprived him of the means readers; but our limits will no longer admit of of providing himself with the necessaries or com-it. However, we shall do what we can; and, forts of life; and therefore you are bound to furnish at all events, no longer withhold them from a him with moderate indeed, but suitable accommo- part at least of this heart-stirring narrative.

dation.

"You have, for the same reason, no right to ruin his habits, by compelling him to be idle, his morals, by compelling him to mix with a promiacuous assemblage of hardened and convicted criminals, or his health by forcing him at night into a damp unventilated cell, with such crowds of companions, as very speedily render the air foul and putrid, or to make him sleep in close contact with the victims of contagious and loathsome disease, or amidst the noxious effluvia of dirt and corruption. In short, no Judge ever condemned a man to be half starved with cold by day, or half suffocated with heat by night. Who ever heard of a criminal being sentenced to Rheumatism, or Typhus fever? Corruption of morals and contamination of mind are not the remedies which the law in its wisdom has thought proper to adopt."*

About four years ago, Mrs. Fry was induced to visit Newgate, by the representations of its stre made by some persons of the Society of Friends

44

"She found the female side in a situation which no language can describe. Nearly three hundred women, sent there for every gradation of crime, some untried, and some under sentence of death. were crowded together in the two wards and twe cells, which are now appropriated to the untried, and which are found quite inadequate to contain even this diminished number with any tolerable convenience. Here they saw their friends, and kept their multitudes of children; and they had no other place for cooking, washing, eating, and sleeping. They all slept on the floor; at times one han dred and twenty in one ward, without so much as a mat for bedding; and many of them were very nearly naked. She saw them openly drinking The abuses in Newgate, that great recepta- spirits; and her ears were offended by the most cle of guilt and misery, constructed to hold terrible imprecations. Every thing was fii hy to about four hundred and eighty prisoners, but excess, and the smell was quite disgusting. Every generally containing, of late years, from eight one, even the Governor, was reluctant to go hundred to twelve hundred, are eloquently watch in the office, telling her that his presence amongst them. He persuaded her to leave her set forth in the publication before us, though would not prevent its being torn from her! She we have no longer left ourselves room to spe- saw enough to convince her that every thing bad cify them. It may be sufficient, however, to was going on. In short, in giving me this account, observe, that the state of the Women's wards she repeatedly said- All I tell thee is a faint picwas universally allowed to be by far the ture of the reality; the filth, the closeness of the worst; and that even Alderman Atkins ad-rooms, the ferocious manners and expressions of the women towards each other, and the abandoned wickedness which every thing bespoke, are quite indescribable.' "—pp. 117–119.

I do not now reprint the detailed statements which formed the bulk of this paper, as originally published; and retain only the account of the mar vellous reformation effected in Nowate, by the of charity

heroic laboura of Mrs. Fry and
-of which I toing it a d
may help to perpetuate

that

the instruction of about seventy children, who Her design, at this time, was confined to were wandering about in this scene of horror and for whom even the most abandoned o