sations, all those acts of depravation which generally accompany them; it partly hinders communication by day, but it does not prevent the prisoners from becoming acquainted with each other, and meeting on their coming out of prison. It can only be maintained by continual and minute inspection. It demands, in order to succeed, frequent and arbitrary punishments; and it may be doubted whether the system can at all be established without the aid of summary and corporal punishments, which public opinion in France would infallibly condemn.

"The system of Philadelphia forbids noctural communications as completely as that of Auburn, excluding at the same time any communication by day. It prevents the prisoners not only talking, but even seeing each other. It results from this, that when a man is released, after a few years' imprisonment, all the ties which attached him to crime are broken. He has lost sight of his old companions, has made no new acquaintances, and finds himself isolated and powerless in the midst of the organised Society of the honest.

The discipline of the system of Philadelphia is simple and easy, because it uses walls and not men. An honest and intelligent prison-director suffices to introduce and maintain it in a vast edifice. The prisoner, being isolated, can offer no resistance; he is alone against society.

"Of all systems of imprisonment that of Philadelphia most strikes the imagination of the condemned, and this is a great advantage. The necessity of making prisons fearful has been too much lost sight of in our days. There the prisoner ought not to suffer bodily; but he must at least find himself unhappy enough, in consequence of his crimes, to deter him from again violating the laws, and to deter others from imitating him.

"Of all penitentiary systems known, that of Philadelphia, without comparison, offers most likelihood of producing reform. It prevents, absolutely, the deterioration of the moral habits of a prisoner, the very contrary being the case in our prisons, and even that of Auburn. Often it has the effect of changing habits and modifying even the ideas. It is idleness which leads people to crime. Amongst good workmen there are no robbers. The system of Philadelphia obliges to work, and obliges even the love of it. Idleness is so great a punishment in solitude, that prisoners would rather do without bread than without work. I have seen them ask, at Philadelphia, as the greatest favour, to be permitted to work; and their greatest punishment is the being deprived of their tools. At Auburn the prisoners are beaten in order to force them to work; at Philadelphia they had rather be beaten than remain idle. They naturally contract the habit, the taste, and the necessity of occupation, and occupation removes them from crime.

"In the system of Philadelphia the prisoner is separated with care from the vicious portion of society, and sheltered from all its corrupted emanations, in order to be exposed solely to honest influences. The Americans put a moral volume in each cell. This book is in general read and often learnt by heart by the prisoner, without his being recommended to do so. To prevent him would be, on the contrary, punishment. I have seen prisoners learn to read, in order to procure the pleasure of perusing this volume. If these same men had been in one of our prisons, they would have trodden under foot that work now so precious to them. It is the same with sensible and moral conversation, which would be turned into ridicule in the common prison rooms, but which is hearkened to as a benefit in the lonely cell. Morals and reason thus penetrate imperceptibly into the heart of each prisoner.

Experience leads me more and more to believe that solitude alone, when it is not absolute, is capable of producing reform. I have gone through all the cells of the Philadelphia penitentiary. I have conversed successively with all the inmates, and I can affirm that I have found the minds of those men in a more satisfactory state than those of any other class of condemned I have ever met with. Their thoughts were grave and calm, their words simple and rational. Isolation had given an intensity to the sentiments which are of use in rendering man moral. I have seen few prisoners who had not tears in their eyes in speaking of their parents, of their children of the place of their birth, and the first years of their youth.

"From all this I conclude, without hesitation, that the system of Philadelphia is a great deal more easy to establish and to maintain in action, is more intimidating, reforms more, and is in general more useful to society than any other. This is quite clear to me. But as I am not pleading here, I will now pass in review the inconveniences of my favourite system.

"The system of Philadelphia costs dearer to establish than that of Auburn. Nevertheless, it is to be considered that if in the first the cells are much larger and more

expensively furnished, on the other hand there is need of neither refectories, working-rooms, hospitals, large courts, double and high exterior walls, nor of that prodigality of bolts and bars, all very dear, and which are requisite in the system of Auburn.

"It is secondly to be considered that, should the system of Philadelphia be adopted, the duration of all punishments would certainly be diminished. And lastly, it must be admitted that a bad prison system, which brings the same men back to be eternally prosecuted, and where the number of delinquents continually increases, is, everything considered, the dearest of all. Every robber levies a double fine upon society; first, by the robbery which he commits, secondly, by the expenses which his detention and punishment occasion. A cheap prison is not cheap if it increases crime; it is adding to the home minister's expenses what it diminishes from the budget of justice.

"It is also objected, that the Philadelphia renders it difficult to employ the prisoners in productive labour. This is true; there are a number of professions and occupations that require the labour of many in common, and sometimes in the open air. This cannot apply to preventive imprisonment, society having no right to make a man work who is not condemned. Nor does it apply to those condemned for terms shorter than a year, it being impossible to train such to continued labour in a workhouse. They are too few, and remain too short a time. With respect to those condemned to long terms of confinement, the Philadelphia renders the profitable employment of them certainly more difficult. But this difficulty should not be exaggerated. The prisoners whom I saw at Philadelphia were occupied, and some of them most profitably occupied. There still remains the difficult question as to how far the state, in employing the condemned in its power, can enter into competition with the free and honest artisan. Such a competition, to the prejudice of the latter, would be throwing on the industrious classes the expenses of criminal justice.

"There remains the third and last objection, and by far the most serious. It is said that solitary imprisonment destroys the health of the prisoners and endangers their life. This is important, and deserves, I grant, all the attention of the legislator. I myself had conceived these fears and expressed them in America. I had indeed seen in Philadelphia men who, shut up in their cells for more than a year, (the Penitentiary itself was open only that time,) had not yet suffered. But I feared lest a longer imprisonment should end by injuring their health, and concluded that it would be wiser to await the result of a longer experience in America; for you know that the finest theories are not worth a fact. This was in 1831, when the king's government had sent me to America with M. de Beaumont. Seven years have elapsed since that time. Tables of mortality for eight years have been drawn up; and it appears from them that if the mortality in the prison of Philadelphia has been a little greater than in that of Auburn, it was much less than in the central prisons of France and amongst the galley slaves, and that it was always above the average mortality of the town of Philadelphia itself. In our country more die in the prisons than without. Solitary imprisonment, such as I imagine it, is not being au secret, since the prisoner has frequent communications with his guardians, with the chaplain, and even with those charitable people who interest themselves in his reform. He is not separated from his family, which he can see under the inspection and with the permission of the government. He is not in a dungeon, but in a healthy room, airy and warm, where he is well fed, well clothed, where he works, and where he can read and write. Solitary imprisonment in this manner makes the mind suffer, it is true, but spares the body-a double effect, which ought to be the aim of every system of imprisonment. A man thus kept in prison is sequestered only from the corrupted portion of society, and prevented from indulging in his vicious habits. An individual at large may lead a more healthy life; but a prison is not an hospital where persons are confined for the good of their health. The end of a prison is to reform and punish.

"I will terminate by saying, that the enemies of the Pennsylvania system have never observed it in action, whilst its partisans have. I went to America opposed to this system; I returned convinced of the necessity of its adoption, if proved that it did not cost the life of the prisoner. Mr. Crawford and M. Julius, sent by England and Prussia, brought back the same conviction; M. Demetz the same. In America, seven years ago, all the states were about to adopt the system of Auburn; they have changed it for that of Philadelphia. After this experience, the cellular system of seclusion by night and by day makes no question as to its being the fittest in France."-From the Moniteur.

INDEX TO VOL. XXIII.

ORIGINAL PAPERS.

Autumnal Trees, by T. J. Ouseley, 62.

Absurdities of Human Life, 74.

Absence, of, 94.

Autobiographical Sketches, by Mrs. Crawford, 189.

British Museum, the, by the Author of “ The Great Metropolis," 17.
British Patriot's Song, the, by T. Ragg, 92.

Beautiful Dead, the, by R. Howitt, 203.

Brothers, the, by Mrs. Abdy, 280.

Courtier of the Reign of Charles II., by Mrs. C. Gore, 78, 177,300, 409.
Cupid and the Harp, by Washington Browne, 128.

Cadet, Memoirs of a, 216, 333.

Deception, a Tale, by Mrs. Abdy, 204, 320.
Dead, the, by Mrs. Edward Thomas, 387.

Father-Love, by the O'Hara Family, 1, 129, 251, 337.

Hymn to Sunset, 112.

Habits and Opinions of the Poets, Milton and Thomson, 243.

Joanna Huntingdon, by the Author of "The Reformer," 51.

Musea Moribunda, 28.

Mems in the Mediterranean, by Launcelot Lamprey, 63, 309, 422.
Mind and Style, by an Irish Barrister, 113.

Memories of Song, the, by Mrs. Abdy, 142.

Mary Ambree, by the Author of “ Phillis Leyton," &c. 433.

Note-Book of an Irish Barrister, the, 225.

Recollection, a, by Washington Browne, 299.

Snatches of Song, by Mrs. C. B. Wilson, 16, 176, 242.

Shakspeare Fancies, 19, 143, 281.

Sign Painter of Naples, the, by Joseph Price, 101.

Sonnet to Venice, by R. Howitt, 332.

Song, the Woodland Well, by R. Howitt, 408.

Sonnet to a Portrait of Lady Jane Grey, by Hans Holbein, by R.
Howitt, 421.

Tattersall's and the Turf, by the Author of "Random Recollections of
the Lords and Commons," 388.

To my Sleeping Babe, by Mrs. Edward Thomas, 448.

Winkle's Journal, omitted in the Pickwick Papers, 158.
Winter Studies and Summer Rambles, 346.

"Will Nothing Love Me?" by the Author of "The Reformer," 369.
Wilt Thou Love Me Still? by Mrs. Crawford, 432.