sistance and advice, the assent of the magistrates was obtained; and a matron was appointed to carry into effect the directions of the committee. The convicts entered into the plan not only with willingness, but with cheerfulness. They chose monitors from amongst themselves to regulate their proceedings. The inactivity and disorder incident to a gaol, have been effectually banished; and the whole now presents a scene of peaceful industry, where their labours are relieved by reading select portions of scripture, or by intervals of necessary refreshment and repose.

Although not immediately connected with the present subject, I cannot dismiss this brief account of the state of the gaol at Liverpool, without also noticing a plan, which has been adopted there for some years past, for preventing the confinement of debtors by unjust arrests; and which from the advantageous effects derived from it, may deserve to be recommended for adoption in other places.

Amongst other modes of testifying the public joy in Liverpool, on the completion of the fif tieth year of His Majesty's reign, it was resolved, at a public meeting of the inhabitants, that a subscription should be entered into for liberating all the debtors confined in the Bòrough gaol. This was accordingly done, and on the day of Jubilee the prisoners were brought

up before the town-hall and discharged, amidst the acclamations of their townsmen. After this object was accomplished, it appeared that a surplus of the subscription remained in the hands of the committee, which it was determined should be invested, and form a fund for the defence of such persons, as might on enquiry appear to have been arrested and committed to gaol without just cause, and who had not the means of providing for their own defence. A measure of this kind was highly necessary in this large commercial place, where seamen, and particularly foreigners, were continually subjected to unjust arrests, and having no friends to whom they could apply, had no alternative but either to remain in gaol, or proceed to sea, on any terms that their perjured oppressors might prescribe. The judicious application of this small fund, in enabling the prisoner to enter upon his defence, with the commendable exertions of the secretaries, has put an effectual end to this abominable system; and notwithstanding the great increase of trade, there are now fewer debtors in gaol than there were when the liberation took place in 1810.*

* The nature of this institution will more fully appear from the Reports in the Appendix, No. XI.

149

ON THE DISCIPLINE OF A PENITENTIARY.

ONE of the most important improvements that has hitherto been suggested in prison discipline, is that of the committee of the House of Commons, appointed, in the last session of parliament, to examine into the state of the prisons in the metropolis; by which they propose a classification of prisons, instead of prisoners; in consequence of which, the several places of confinement in the metropolis, instead of being filled, as they are at present, with promiscuous prisoners of every description, would each be appropriated to a distinct class; so that debtors, persons untried, misdemeanants, and felons, may each be confined in separate places, and subjected to such regulations as the case requires. "In this way," they observe, "great additional accommodation would be afforded in each prison; and a mode of discipline might be adopted, suited to the condition of each class and description of offenders. The rules of rigour that are proper for convicted criminals, are surely improper to be applied to the untried; and the fine for a misdemeanour, cannot, in justice, be subject to the same severity of discipline

which is applied to the correction of the felon." Upon the same principle, it must be obvious to any one who considers the subject, that a Penitentiary is not a fit place of confinement for persons untried, and who are detained merely for safe custody; it being as yet undecided whether such persons be guilty or not; so that it would be, at least, premature, if not unjust, to subject them to a course of discipline, under the idea of effecting their reformation.

In the next place, it must be apparent, that when a person has been received into a Penitentiary, and has gone through the discipline of the place, and been discharged, as reformed, such a person ought not to be again received upon the commission of a new offence; because the process having been tried, and failed of its effect, a repetition of it can only be expected to be attended with a similar result; and consequently it becomes necessary, in that instance, to resort to a different mode of treatment.

Again, there may, in the opinion of many persons, and perhaps in the general estimation, be some crimes of such a character, either from their atrocity or their nature, as to render the delinquent an unfit object of admission into such an establishment; the perpetrators of which crimes must, therefore, be left to the punishments which the law has provided for

them. And, on the other hand, there will always be a great class of minor offenders, who although the proper objects of correction, would, perhaps, be thought to be too severely visited by a sentence of imprisonment, for a period of sufficient duration, to admit of the discipline of a Penitentiary being attended by the desired effect.

Thus, then, it appears that the proper objects of a Penitentiary are only such persons, as have by their offences, subjected themselves to the operation of the law, and of whose reform a reasonable expectation may be entertained. A Penitentiary is not, therefore, a gaol; nor can it be combined, or perhaps united in the same building with a gaol, without its expected benefits being greatly diminished, if not wholly frustrated. It may rather be considered as a recurrence to our ancient establishment of a house of correction, with this most essential difference, that instead of punishing the criminal according to the supposed enormity of his offence, by stripes and severity, as was formerly the case, it professes, by measures more consistent with humane feelings and Christian principles, to reclaim and restore him again to society. Persons committed for life, or for long and irredeemable terms of years, are, therefore, no proper objects of a Penitentiary; as they would occupy a permanent sta