CHAPTER XI.
INDISCRIMINATE ASSOCIATION OF PRISONERS—TRANSPORTATION, AND THE CAUSE OF ITS FAILURE—A GUNSMITH.
As I have already said in a previous chapter, one of the most glaring defects in our present system of penal servitude, viewed as a means of reformation as well as of punishment, is the indiscriminate association of all classes of criminals, or rather all criminals with a certain sentence, irrespective of the nature of the crime they have committed, the previous character of the criminal or the probability of his re-admission into society as an honest and useful member of it. I have met in the same ward prisoners of widely different characters and antecedents, whose crimes afforded conclusive proofs that in habits, disposition, and general conduct, they would never, in the natural order of things, become associates, compelled by law to mate with each other as equals, and to learn of each other how to injure, not how to benefit society and themselves. There are, for instance, certain crimes which a man may commit under the influence of strong passions, aroused in moments of great temptation, such as rape; or of great provocation, such as manslaughter; or committed under the pressure of misfortune, or to avoid, impending ruin, such as forgery or embezzlement, which do not necessarily prove the criminal to be of habitually depraved habits, or generally of a violent and vicious disposition. I found as a rule prisoners guilty of these crimes undergoing their first sentences. Prison life and prison associations were new to them as to me. They had no inclination to repeat the offence, or to pursue a career of crime, but rather disposed to redeem their character, and live an honest and industrious life. Yet this class of prisoners are condemned, in addition to the loss of liberty and character, to live in constant contact, for years it may be, with the professional thief and house-breaker, the burglar, and the garotter, who has been frequently convicted, and whose whole life is spent between the prison and the "cross." The natural and inevitable result of this is contamination. Even in the case of men possessing high principle and of great moral fortitude the effect would be deteriorating and pernicious. With men of weak resolution, strong passions, and a comparatively low standard of morality, the consequences cannot be doubtful in the majority of cases. They gradually lose self-respect, cease to think of reformation or amendment, in time they come to envy the hardened stoicism and "gameness" of the practised ruffian, learn his language, imbibe his notions of life, and finally resolve, since character, self-respect, and all else that bind them to morality and virtue are lost, that they will compel society to make amends for the ruin it has brought upon them. It is from this class I am persuaded that the ranks of our born and bred convicts are so largely and so constantly supplemented. Yet how easily and how speedily might this source of supply be diminished, if not altogether closed.
The old Transportation Act, although it may not have provided for any such separation as that I have just indicated, and although it was based on what I consider pernicious principles, was undoubtedly the most effectual plan for getting rid of our criminal population, and in its operation the most merciful to the prisoner of any of our recent parliamentary enactments. Had its provisions been efficiently and judiciously administered, we might still have been sending convicts to our colonies. But the business of exporting our "dirty linen" was grossly mismanaged. The merchant who hopes to succeed as an exporter must study carefully the class of goods suitable for the market he proposes to supply, and send only those he is confident will be approved of and meet a ready sale. But our prison authorities, by some fatality, so organized the system of selection of convicts for transportation that those who were, of all men, the very last a young and virtuous community would seek, were forced upon them, whilst those for whom there was a constant demand, and who would have regarded transportation and liberation abroad as the opportunity for escaping from social prejudice, of retrieving their lost character, and of commencing anew a life of honesty and industry, were condemned to pine in the prisons at home, and in too many cases, to adopt a career of crime when their sentences expired. The first and great commandment the prison authorities regarded in their selection was, that the prisoner should be physically healthy, sound in wind and limb; and the second was, that he should have been a certain time in prison at home after receiving his last sentence and conducted himself well whilst there. No enquiry was made into the prisoner's previous history, employment, education, or general disposition and habits, which, one would naturally have thought necessary before any intelligent opinion could be formed as to the probabilities of his future career abroad. Now, although the qualifications of health and good conduct might seem to be good and sufficient grounds on which to make such a selection as was required for transportation, those acquainted with prisoners and prison life will at once perceive that they were very far from being so. In the first place, a great many of the prisoners who would have adopted an honest life and been a benefit to the colonies if they had been sent there, but who were rejected on account of ill-health, had become diseased in prison and in consequence of their imprisonment, and would in all probability have recovered their usual good health before they had reached their destination abroad. These were generally men of education, and accustomed to generous diet, but the prison discipline and scale of dietary soon told upon their health, and disqualified them in the eyes of the prison officials for the boon of transportation. Even if their health was not restored by the sea voyage and liberation abroad, it was only exchanging the hospital abroad for the hospital at home. If the experiment succeeded, who may estimate its value to him who was the subject of it? Again, "good conduct," as indicated by the standard of our prison authorities, is anything but a trustworthy criterion of the convict's true character and disposition. It does not mean that the prisoner has shown himself honest, industrious, or well disposed, or in any active sense what the phrase is ordinarily supposed to mean; indeed the system of penal servitude does not permit the prisoner any opportunity of showing that he is so. All that "good conduct," in prison official language means is, that the prisoner has not broken any of the prison rules, and is therefore a purely negative quality; scrupulous obedience to prison discipline and regulations, with severe penalties attached to transgression, is a very sorry basis on which to found a character of good conduct in a convict. The consequence was, if one of the greatest ruffians that ever entered the prison gates were to make up his mind, as I have known many of them do, to go abroad, he knew that he had only to study the rules of the prison and obey them for a certain length of time, and he would obtain his object, and be let loose among the innocent colonists, to rob and murder as he found opportunity. Thousands of such men, who had purposely behaved themselves well in the prison at home, with the grim determination of making amends for their restraint by a career of increased violence and ruffianism abroad, were thus let loose upon colonial society, and there is no wonder that the colonies rose up in indignation and shut their ports against them. As a rule, it was the hardened criminal whose reformation under existing laws was, I may safely say, entirely out of the question, who, on the score of health and good conduct, most perfectly fulfilled the conditions required by the prison authorities, and most frequently had the boon of transportation extended to him. Accustomed by long and frequent experience to prison diet and discipline, and to all the "dodges" for augmenting the one and evading or modifying the other, he could keep himself in perfect health under circumstances which would send a less experienced and more sensitive man to the hospital in a month; whilst his familiarity with all the petty rules and regulations of the prison, which the novice is in constant danger of breaking (quite unintentionally), enabled him to steer clear of any offence that could be reported if he thought it for his interest to strive for the convict's prize. In fact, "good conduct," as exemplified by a convict according to the prison standard, affords no more reliable evidence of his moral qualities and industrious habits, than proficiency in drill affords of the moral character of the private soldier.
It is quite clear that selection on these terms could only by a rare accident find the suitable men for sending abroad. And yet it is my firm conviction that I, or any other man possessing ordinary intelligence and insight into human character and experience of convict life, could, with the utmost ease, have selected from the inmates of our prisons a very large number for exportation, whom our colonists would have been glad to receive, and who would have been rescued from a life of ignominy or crime at home. The question may very naturally be asked—Why could not our prison officials have done the same? The only answer I can give is that our prison officials (excepting the very highest) are directly interested inmaintainingandincreasing, and not inreducing, the number of our convicts, and they are therefore inclined to favour the liberation of those whom they are pretty sure will soon return.
As a fair and forcible example of the advantage which might have been taken of the "Transportation Act," in dealing with a certain class of prisoners, and also as an illustration—not nearly so forcible as others I have alluded to, and will yet notice—of the fault of the authorities in the matter of selection, I will mention one case. Three young men received sentence of twenty years' penal servitude for rape. One of them, quite a youth, was more a spectator of than a principal in the crime, the other two being the really guilty parties. The three were in due course sent to Portsmouth. The guilty pair were sent abroad, and liberated before the end of five years from the date of their conviction. One of them is now married and settled comfortably abroad, and the other lodges with him. The other prisoner, being young and not very muscular, received some injury while at work and was sent to the Invalid Criminal Hospital in Surrey, and has to remain in prison, in a state useless to himself and to society, for eight or nine years longer than his more guilty companions.
But the day has gone by for successful re-establishment of a penal colony. I do not think there are many who would commit crimes for the express purpose of getting abroad, unless the colony was very attractive; but no country where officers can be got to reside will ever be looked upon with dread by the majority of criminals. A penal colony, I am convinced, would have no deterring influence on the minds of those convicts who are most difficult to deal with. It would have such an effect upon certain classes of prisoners, but their numbers are small, and less expensive remedies might be found even more effectual in their cases.
When convicts leave prison they could be divided into three classes. First, those men who are not only determined to live honestly, but who in all human probability will never again enter a prison; their number may amount to about ten per cent. of the whole. Another class leave prison with the deliberate intention of committing crime, and their number may be about forty per cent. The third class, comprising about fifty per cent. of the whole, belong to the hesitating, unsteady, wavering class. Many of this class do manage to keep out of prison, but at least one half of them return, and, along with the forty per cent. of professionals, bring up the number of the re-convicted to seventy per cent. Now, it must be quite clear that if we would reduce this number, it is to the fifty per cent of waverers that our efforts must be principally directed. The other classes either do not require or will not benefit by our endeavours. Our present law is altogether unable to cure the professional thief. I never heard, and I never met with a convict who ever heard, of any of this class being converted into honest men by the operation of our present system, nor do I believe it possible to point to a single case. The professional thief lacks three virtues—economy, industry, honesty. Now, under the present system it is positively forbidden to give him any practical lesson either in economy or honesty; industry, indeed, might be taught him, but he rarely if ever receives an intelligent lesson, for it must be remembered that enforced labour does not teach the labourer industry, but is more likely to inspire him with an aversion to it. All that can be done with the professional thief, under existing laws, beyond the punishment of confinement and vigorous prison discipline, possibly, is to give him such work to do as he can do, or be readily taught to do, and that work not to be of the kind usually done in prison, but such as will compensate to some extent for his maintenance in prison, and enable him to live honestly out of it should he so elect.
On my right hand, in the twenty-four-bedded room, lay a city-bred professional thief, acquainted with all the brothels and sinks of iniquity in London, and his disgusting conversation chiefly related to such places. Like many of his class, his constitution was delicate, and his appetite somewhat dainty. The prison fare and hard work were undoubtedly severe punishment to him; but no punishment could frighten him into honesty. He knew no honest trade by which he could support himself, but if he had been taught one in prison such as suited his strength and talents, and had been taught only thepolicyof honesty, and been then sent to a country far removed from his old haunts, where his newly-organized trade would be more profitable than thieving, the possibility is he would have become a useful man in the world. On the expiration of his sentence, which was three years, he went home and wrote back to one of his "pals" in prison, under an assumed name, that he had been to the Prisoners' Aid Society, and had obtained as much of his gratuity as he could, to buy a barrow and some fruit, as he meant to turn costermonger. He added, however, that he did not like fruit-selling, and returned to his old trade of "gunsmith," gunning being the slang term for thieving, or going on the cross. The real fact was, that he never intended anything else than being a "gunsmith," but only used the deception in order to obtain a little more money from the Aid Society than he otherwise could. As soon as he got his barrow and stock he sold all off, and in a very few months I had him for a companion again, with a seven years' sentence. I remember asking whether he preferred a sentence of seven years' penal servitude, or three years in Coldbath Fields?
"Three years in Coldbath Fields! why that would kill me. I would as soon have fifteen years here."
The only good trait discoverable in his character was his ardent affection for his mother. When he has completed about five years and three months he will be liberated again, if he is alive, and again he will return to crime; and it is almost impossible that such a man can do otherwise; and as long as our prison authorities regard convicts as mere living automatons, all modelled after the same fashion in iniquity, our convict and county prisons, viewed as reformatories, will remain quite inoperative for good, but very potent for evil.
CHAPTER XII.
HOW REBELS AGAINST SOCIETY ARE MADE—I AM REMOVED TO A SMALL ROOM AMONGST MURDERERS—THE "HIGHFLYER" AGAIN—HOW A YOUNG GENTLEMAN WAS MADE A WARNING TO OTHERS.
A certain class of criminals—it would be very wrong to say all—may be looked upon as rebels against society, and assuming that they are so, it would be difficult to conceive a more effective method of promoting and disseminating the spirit of rebellion than that which is adopted in our convict establishments. We collect all these rebels from the various counties into a few localities, 600 here, 1000 there, and 1500 somewhere else, and along with them we place a certain proportion of comparatively untainted men. We subject them to a course of rigorous discipline in matters of diet and exercise, the sole effect of which is to stimulate them still more against society. We allow them a certain amount of intercourse with each other; liberty to the old to contaminate the young; to the veteran ruffian to enlist and drill the new recruit; to all to plan their new campaigns, and hatch new conspiracies, and then disperse them throughout the country to sow the seeds of sedition, and raise the standard of rebellion wherever they may go. This is really what is being done in our convict prisons. Take an extreme case, and keep out of sight altogether the characters and dispositions of our criminals, and imagine a hundred of England's most steady, honest, and industrious working men placed in our convict establishments for a few years, and what would be the result? It would most probably be this: if they were young, and had only received an imperfect education, fifty of them would join some branch of the thief profession if kept by force in convict society for three years; seventy of them would do so if kept for six years; and if kept ten years, they would almost all be corrupted, and become when liberated a source of corruption themselves.
But if the hardened and incorrigible criminals were really punished in any proportion to the others the system would have a kind of consistent iniquity about it which it does not possess. My left-hand companion was an old agricultural labourer, one of a large class to whom a convict prison is no punishment. He had been brought up to work, and although an old man, he could work far more than a city thief, and yet not work hard. He had brought up a family who were all scattered abroad. He had now no real home when out of prison, and his third penal sentence of fourteen years was very much lighter punishment to him than fourteen days, with loss of character, would be to anyone in the upper or middle classes of society. I met many such men in prison, and I used to ask them how much money they would take to do my sentence in addition to their own? One would say 100l., another, 50l., another 40l., and some would even take considerably less.
Imprisonment with hard labour will never have the slightest effect in deterring such men from committing crime. Labour that would soon kill many other men would not punish them, but they would prefer it even to sitting in school. Rough fare they can do with, as long as it fills the belly. They have no other ambition to gratify. With the stomach distended and a quid of tobacco in their mouths, they are as happy as kings, and very careless about liberty. Many of them when they leave the prison, leave home. To such men, and to all the class of vagrant and pauper criminals, a convict prison means a comfortable home, where they are fed and clothed, and bathed and physicked, and have all their wants supplied, without trouble or care, in exchange for their liberty and such labour as they can easily and cheaply perform. To the professional thieves a convict prison is a Court of Bankruptcy, to be avoided if possible, and to be made the most of when unavoidable. A place of punishment no doubt, but punishment nearly useless and entirely misdirected. To the man who has wrought for his living at some honest trade, up to the commission of his first known offence, who has been accounted respectable by his neighbours, and who belongs to a class of society with whom loss of character is utter ruin—a convict prison is a Hell. If he happen also to be a man of thought and education, it will in addition appear to be an institution for robbing honest tax-payers, and a nursery of vice and crime, which all good men should endeavour to reform or destroy.
In the small room to which I was now removed, the lodgers were quiet, inoffensive men, and in a few cases apparently religious.
During my residence in the prison I was frequently removed from one room to another, to suit the convenience of the prison authorities. Fortunately I had no rent to pay, no economy to study, no opportunity to practice honesty, and my effects were easily carried about. Obedience—the soldiers' virtue—and civility, were all I had to study, and these were not difficult to practice in my own case. One class of prisoners in these rooms were elderly men, who had committed murder, or manslaughter, and who, from their age and infirmities had missed being sent to Western Australia. I knew upwards of twenty of them, and generally speaking, they were quiet, inoffensive men, with no inclination to steal or to do wrong. Several of them had very hot tempers, all of them, indeed, who committed their crimes under the influence of anger; others I sympathized with a good deal, inasmuch as they had been sorely tempted, and seemed penitent and honest.
One of them had brought up a family of honest working men. After the death of their mother, he married and lived with another woman, who was addicted to intemperance, and he was so annoyed at her conduct and by her tongue, that his passion obtained the mastery over him, and in a moment of frenzy he killed her. This prisoner had had his arm broken at Portland, which prevented his being sent abroad, whence he would have been liberated by this time.
Another case was that of a comparatively young man, who shot his sweetheart because she had chosen another man just as the prisoner was looking forward to his marriage with her. He tried to shoot himself at the same time, but the shot passed through the jaw and cheek bones, leaving him in a sadly disfigured condition to meet his doom of penal servitude for life.
I met several cases where murder was committed through jealousy. One man murdered his wife for flirting or cohabiting with another man. A second murdered the paramour and spared his wife, and so on. In the majority of these cases, the prisoners were very unlikely to commit a second offence.
There was one very peculiar case which I will here mention. The prisoner was the worst cripple perhaps in the prison, and the quietest man in it. He rarely spoke to anyone unless he was first spoken to, and his answers were very brief. This man committed a deliberate murder; although he had only one arm and but one good leg. He lay in wait for his victim, and his motive for perpetrating the deed was not money but revenge. The person he killed had injured or defrauded his father before he died, and being unable to obtain justice he took revenge, and is now paying the full penalty. He sits in the workroom along with the others, but being paralyzed he is not compelled to work at anything.
Another peculiar case was that of a man who had starved his mother to death, in order to obtain possession of her money. He was a miser, and was often taunted for his crime by the thief fraternity. He was the filthiest neighbour I ever had. Most of the prisoners are cleanly in their habits, but this one was the reverse. He would have his food stored away beside him, rather than give it to a fellow prisoner. He was not a great eater, and at one time there was more food about than the prisoners could consume; but whatever he got he kept until it was taken from him. After being confined for about thirteen years, he was allowed to go to North America, on a conditional pardon, to a son who lived there. Among the many petitions I drew out for prisoners to copy, his was the only one that ever succeeded. I have written petitions for dying men to the Home Secretary, for permission to go out and die at home, and many without any just grounds at all, but none succeeded, save the one I have mentioned above.
I have repeatedly asked prisoners under sentences of penal servitude for life whether they would prefer that sentence to being hanged. The general reply was "I would rather be 'topt' at once, and be out of my misery, than remain in prison all my days." "It's bad enough when I have the prospect of liberty in twelve years." "If they are going to keep men in prison all their days, and torture them besides, they'll commit suicide or murder in prison. Look at Townley, who threw himself over the stair-railings at Pentonville and killed himself."
Such would be the answers I would receive to my questions on this subject. With reference to Townley's case I was told by an intelligent prisoner, who knew him and saw him commit suicide, that it was committed mainly in consequence of the cruel, absurd and childish system of suppressing a prisoner's letters to his friends, on grounds usually hostile to the interests of society, viz., the concealment of truth.
Another class of prisoners were "coiners." These were generally "fly-men." They knew every point of the law on the subject, and as a rule returned to their profession as soon as they got their "ticket." Prison is no doubt a great punishment to such men, because they can make a good living at their business; but I question if ever there was a reformed coiner. They are usually well-conducted prisoners, that is, they are civil and do what they are told, but their influence over others is very pernicious. A very considerable number of the convicts left the prison with the intention of "hawking" from place to place, and doing a little bit on the "cross" when they saw the coast clear, which meant either stealing or "snyde-pitching." These hawkers found friends in the coiners, who would tell them where they could get the bad money, so that if they could not work themselves they could do a friend a turn in the way of business. I knew several instances of prisoners with a first conviction getting a second in consequence of being told where to get bad money; and I knew many more who will, in all human probability, meet with the same fate from the same cause.
Another of my fellow prisoners was a singular specimen. I have already referred to him as being almost the only "highflyer" in the prison, as being the man who once obtained 150l.from a gentleman in Devonshire under false pretences. This man was not ranked among the "aristoes" in prison society, although he was in many respects their equal or superior in certain branches of education. And here I may remark that on parade, where all the prisoners exercised together, they associated in classes as they would do outside—the "roughs," the "prigs," the "needy-mizzlers," and the "aristoes," keeping, not always, but pretty much among themselves. There were only a few of the class termed "aristoes," and they comprised men who had been clergymen, merchants, bankers, editors, surgeons, &c. These were usually my associates during the exercise time. Now the "highflyer" I have referred to did not belong to this class, but except in his principles and habits and tastes, his education was quite equal to theirs. He spoke German and French fluently, knew Latin and Greek, a smattering of Italian, and the higher branches of mathematics. What first surprised me about him was his pretended intimacy with some German merchants of the highest standing I knew in London, and with whom I had done business. To know such men I afterwards found was part of his profession. He could tell me not only the names and titles of the nobility and gentry, but the names of their families, where many of them were educated, to whom they were married, and many other particulars of their private history. His sentence was three years, and I believe he got it something in this way. He had been in the country following his profession, and had obtained some money, I think thirty pounds, from a gentleman of "his acquaintance." In the country he was the Reverend Dr. So and So, with a white neck-tie and all the surroundings of a clergyman. In London he was a "swell," with a cigar in his mouth.
It so happened that the benevolent gentleman from whom he had obtained the money came to town and recognized the "Doctor," when cutting the swell, and had him apprehended and punished. He had been several times in county prisons, but, as he always changed his name and his localities, this fact was not known officially. He was an avowed infidel, and seemed to delight in spreading his opinions among the prisoners, who were generally too willing to listen to him. If he keeps out of prison, it will be his cleverness in escaping detection and not his principles that will save him. His prison influence was most pernicious, and afforded another striking and painful illustration of the evils of indiscriminate association of prisoners. I maintain that it formed no part of any prisoner's sentence that, in addition to all the other horrors of penal servitude, he should be placed within the sphere of this man's influence and such as he; and the system which not only permits but demands that his moral and religious interests should be thus imperilled, if not altogether corrupted and destroyed, undertakes a fearful responsibility.
The next case I will notice will illustrate the truth of what I have advanced on this point. It was that of a young man, P——, who had been respectably educated, and whose crime was simply the foolish frolic of a giddy youth. He had engaged a dog-cart to drive to London, a distance somewhere about fifty miles from where he resided. He had another youth for his companion, and they both got on the "spree" in London. Some shark picked them up, and bought the horse and dog-cart from them at a merely nominal price. When they got sober they returned home, and this youth went and told the proprietor of the dog-cart what he had done, and (according to his own statement) offered, through his friends, to pay for it. The proprietor was so enraged, however, that nothing but the prosecution of the prisoner would satisfy him, and he was sentenced to ten years' penal servitude. He had the character of a "fast" youth, and met with a severe judge. This prisoner might have been easily led into the path of honour and usefulness, if the attempt had been honestly made. Whoever his judge was, if he were an Englishman and father of a family, he would never again pass sentence of penal servitude on such a youth for any offence against property, if he knew as well as I do what the sentence involves. Shut up any such man for seven years in a place where the only men of his own age are city-bred thieves, and what can be expected of him? This young man elected the smartest and cleverest of the London pickpockets for his companions. They made a tool of him in prison, and unless his friends have managed to get him sent abroad, he is very likely acting as a "stall" for some of his old companions now. He never learnt anything in prison exceptknitting. He was also one of the "readers," but most of his time was spent in hospital. He could spit blood when he chose, and the doctor being more liberal to him than many others, for several very natural reasons, the prisoner used this liberality to benefit some of his "pals" who could not manage to get the good things they wanted from the doctor otherwise. In return for this kindness he would get an inch or two of tobacco, or "snout," as it was usually termed. When other means failed to procure this luxury, he would write to his friends for a toothbrush and sell it for the weed, which caused the toothbrushes to be withdrawn from all the prisoners. Then he would write for a pair of spectacles, pretending that his eyes were getting weak. These he sold, and the last were discovered passing into one of the cooks' hands in fair exchange for mutton chops. They were taken into the governor's room, and after being examined by that potentate they were laid on his desk, and next morning they were nowhere to be found; they were stolen, butnotby a prisoner. Of course, P—— knew nothing about his spectacles, when examined on the subject, except that some one must have taken them from his shelf. The result was that all spectacles belonging to the prisoners were called in, and prison "glasses" issued in their stead. The spectacles were intended ultimately to reach the hands of an officer for tobacco, and if they had not been removed from the desk, the officer might have got his discharge and the prisoner a severe punishment. This was one of the thousand-and-one schemes which prisoners resort to in order to get "snout," and without the aid of an officer they can get none.
This youth was intended by his parents for the church, but was trained in prison to be a thief, as "a warning to others"—and his was far from being a solitary case.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE ACT OF 1864—CLASSIFICATION OF PRISONERS—THE MARK SYSTEM: ITS DEFECTS—THE TRUE CRIMINAL LAW OF RESTITUTION—THE ONLY METHOD BY WHICH CONFIRMED CRIMINALS MAY BE RECLAIMED—WORKHOUSES.
The year 1864 was a marked epoch in convict life. A new Act was then passed and fresh prison regulations were brought into force. This Act contained one good clause, viz., the abolition of three and four years' sentences. In one year as many as 1800 men were sentenced to three and four years' penal servitude, being a large proportion of the total number. Such men are now for the most part sentenced to eighteen months and two years' imprisonment, which will account for a decrease in the number of convicts and an increase in the number of county prisoners. This is a short step in the right direction. The convict directors take credit to themselves for this reduction in the number of convicts, and boast that they have at last found the true panacea for criminal diseases. A report to that effect, cut out of a newspaper, was circulated amongst the prisoners, and their indignation was great at the way in which the public were "gulled" about themselves and prison treatment. No doubt a few more thieves and burglars are driven to pursue their callings in France and America by the operation of the new police regulations, and I freely admit that a few more may annually be sent into another world by the same means, but no one can yet point to a reformed professional "Cracksman," "Coiner," "Hoister," or "Screwsman," as proof of the beneficial results of the change. The most unpopular clause in the Act was that relating to police surveillance. The majority of the prisoners were very much annoyed at this regulation, some of them, indeed, would much rather have remained in prison than encounter it. For my own part, I approve of the principle of surveillance. I see in it the germ of a system whereby a large class of criminals may ultimately be punished entirely outside the prison walls. I object, however, to the police being entrusted with the duty. Their proper business is to catch the thief and preserve order. The surveillance of liberated prisoners ought to be entrusted to those who are directly interested in empty jails, and who would endeavour to assist the liberated men either in getting employment or to emigrate.
With reference to theclassificationof prisoners which commenced under the Act of 1864, I have no hesitation in saying that it is a gross fraud upon the public, a delusion and a snare. The error which I pointed out in a former chapter, as being committed in the selection of convicts for transportation, is here repeated and in a more aggravated form, if that were possible. By the new Act the prisoners were divided into four great classes. Into the fourth, or "probation class," all prisoners were required to enter on being admitted into prison. After a certain time, if the prisoner was so fortunate as to escape being "reported" for any offence against the prison rules, he would be placed in the third class, and again, after being a certain time in the third class he was passed, subject to the same condition, into the second, and so on. Should he have made any mistake and allowed himself to get "reported," he either missed his chance of getting into the higher, or was degraded into a lower class. The object of this classification no doubt was to get all the well-behaved men together, but the blunder committed was in making obedience to the prison rules the only test of qualification for the higher classes. This, as I have already explained, was really worse than no test at all, because the frequently convicted criminal, who was thoroughly posted up in all points of prison discipline and regulations, was more likely than the novice to escape being "reported" for violation of them. The consequence is, that in respect of character, disposition and moral quality, there is really no difference to be found amongst the men in any of the classes. The scheme operates in this way—suppose that a clergyman by some mischance gets sentenced to penal servitude, and enters the prison in company with one of the very worst villains that could be selected out of our criminal population; both these men, the one with a first sentence, the other with a long string of convictions against him, enter the "probation class" at Millbank, on precisely the same terms. The "jail bird," knowing all about the ways of the prison, would probably pass with ease into the third class. The clergyman, being new to the discipline, might make a mistake and get "reported," and in that way would not be so likely to reach the third class so soon as the other; but granting that he did so they would still be together, the man inured to guilt and crime would still be beside the new and casual lodger, the man who had never been in prison before would still have the opportunity of learning the evil ways of the confirmed rogue. Again, should the clergyman be fortunate enough in passing into the higher classes at the usual time, the jail bird would certainly not be behind.
If a thousand prisoners, from all parts of the country, of all ages, habits, and antecedents, were brought to one of our convict establishments, they would go through their time in the same way, good, bad, and indifferent, all together. The clergyman, even if he were to get into prison innocently, and were the best Christian in the world, would never get rid of the jail-bird; and in the highest class his companions would be no better than those in the lowest.
I grant that our directors could not classify convicts according to their real merits, any more than a quack doctor could classify patients suffering from disease; but although they cannot have the knowledge necessary to do it properly, they might do a little in the right direction. The quack, even, would know cholic from consumption, diarrhæa from dropsy; so any man of sense would be able to distinguish between a case of chronic moral disease and a case of partial or temporary paralysis of the moral faculty!
The system of "marks," as it is called in prison, is the most prominent feature in the new regulations, and is based upon the same absurd principle as the classification clause. The rule relating to marks specifies "That the time which every convict under sentence of penal servitude must henceforth pass in prison will be regulated by a certain number of marks, which he must earn by actual labour performed before he can be discharged."
The method adopted is to debit the prisoner with a certain number of marks, according to the length of his sentence, and if he performs the whole of the work required of him he is credited with as many marks as would represent a fourth part of his sentence.
If this law were carried out in its integrity it would be most cruel and unjust. Fortunately for the prisoners it is not very strictly adhered to—at least not at the prison where I was confined—the officers making allowance for the prisoners' infirmities. To show how it would operate, let us take the case of the clergyman and the jail-bird once more. Assuming that the former was a stout and healthy man, and able to work, but not having been accustomed to it, really not able to do much of it, and that the latter had been at the work for years—which would win in the race for liberty, if the law was strictly enforced? The probability is that the clergyman would not earn a single day's remission, whilst the jail-bird would get one-fourth of his time remitted; and assuming that both had the same sentence originally, would go a considerable way into a "fresh bit" before the poor clergyman had finished his first sentence.
The "mark" system admits of great cruelty being practised, but on the whole, as it is carried out, it is a more innocent piece of deception than the classification. At the public works, however, there is much injustice done by it, no allowance being made for a sick man, unless he has met with some accident. If the "marks" were money,bonâ fidesovereigns, and if the prisoner were permitted to exercise the abilities God has given him in order to earn that money, there might be some sense and justice discernable in the system. As it is there is neither.
I may here venture to say that we might materially diminish crime and expense connected with the prosecution and punishment of criminals by doing away with our convict establishments altogether, except for the confinement of political prisoners, and those having sentences for life. In lieu of these I would suggest the introduction of the system of remissions into our county jails, granting first offenders a liberal, and third and fourth, an extremely small allowance. Teaching the prisoners such trades as they are fitted for, qualifying them for colonists, and selecting the most suitable for emigration. I would also place the jails and workhouses under one management. Commissioners for the prevention of crime and pauperism in each county, and subject them to a rigid government inspection by a board responsible to Parliament and the nation.
But even this would only be a partial reform. I would have our criminal laws based upon the old Mosaic principle of "enforced restitution," and carried out on the Christian principle of making the offender "pay the uttermost farthing." Then we could fairly and justly retain the idle and the useless in the net of justice, and allow the willing and industrious to achieve their own freedom by satisfying the claims of the law.
Now, when time has been strangled, and virtue repressed, we allow the worst villains to escape, and all that has been required of them in prison was civility to officers, obedience to a stupid discipline, and a few years' work which neither enables them to support an honest livelihood outside the prison, or contributes in any appreciable degree to their maintenance inside.
Under the system I propose, every man who stole a sheep would have to pay the same penalty before he could exercise the rights of citizenship—no matter whether his character was good, bad, or indifferent; no matter whether he was rich or poor, a peer or a peasant, the voice of impartial justice would say, "You have incurred the same debt to the State, and the same penalty must be paid."
At present every man who steals a sheep has to pay a different penalty. This man is sentenced to six months, that other to twelve months, and then another to fifteen years of penal servitude, according to the discretion of the judge; and instead of being made to pay the price of the sheep and the costs of his prosecution, he becomes a grievous burden to the honest tax-payer, who has to supply him with chaplains, schoolmasters, surgeons, cooks, bakers, tailors, and a whole host of servants in livery to minister to his wants, and so unfit him for the practice of economy, frugality, and other kindred virtues when his fetters are cut. Under a law based on the principle of restitution, the man of good character and industrious habits might be able to find sureties to enable him to discharge his debt to the State under the surveillance of the authorities, without being surrounded by prison walls. The man of middling character might only have a limited amount of liberty, such as the responsible authorities might grant him. Whilst the man of bad character would have to discharge his debt inside prison walls, where he might still continue a villain in habits and heart, and increase his debt by fresh acts of dishonesty; but this would be his own fault, and the safety-valve of the machinery.
But to return to the Act 1864. If the labour performed under the "mark" system was either remunerative, or such as a convict might obtain an honest living at when liberated, the system could not be condemned as utterly bad. But if we except the tailoring and the shoemaking done for the use of the establishment, there are really no other employments suitable for the general class of men who find their way into prison. The professional thief—and I am now speaking of thereformationas well as the punishment of criminals—requires to be taught some trade for which he has a natural aptitude before it is possible for him to gain a livelihood, and he must be taught it well, for unless he is a skilled workman he would not be worth the wages necessary to keep him out of temptation. To go on punishing such men in the hope that we will make them honest, is absurd; and to persevere in "reforming," them without teaching them practically that which is indispensable to their remaining honest, is equally ridiculous. We may train a boy to be a labourer of almost any sort, and can impart moral and religious instruction to an unformed mind with success, but if we attempt to do either of them with a confirmed thief who has not been taught to work, we must be disappointed in the result. Thefirststep to reformation, is to interest him in some employment suitable to his abilities, and any other step taken before this only hinders or prevents the work of reformation. We have never yet taken this first step, consequently we have never yet succeeded in reforming any of them. It is also essential that such work should be also well paid, and that the money made at such employment should be his passport to liberty. Under the present system we only make him kill time at labour which disgusts him with all kinds of regular industry. The county prison sentences are, moreover, too short to enable the thief to earn such a passport to freedom, but they are of just the requisite length and fitness for turning the casual into the confirmed criminal. In fact,timesentences are not suitable for confirmed thieves. Their sentences ought to be so much money to be earned in a penal workshop, where honesty and economy could be practised as well as industry. There are two grave objections urged against teaching thieves lucrative trades. Firstly,—it would tempt others to commit crime; and secondly, it would interfere with free labour. With regard to the first objection, I admit there would be some force in it if the sentences were such as they are now, because time runs on, whether the prisoner is industrious or not. But if the sentence imposed a fine in addition to all the expenses incurred by the prisoner during his incarceration, there would then be no inducement to the commission of crime. With reference to the second objection, I would merely state that all labour done in prison of a useful character interferes with free labour to some extent, but I contend that if each prisoner was employed at that kind of work for which he is best qualified, it would interfere less with the proper and necessary division of free labour than the present plan of keeping a large number of men employed at work for which they have no special aptitude.
The error we have made in employing prisoners hitherto is not merely that we have employed them at trades or other employments not suitable to their natural abilities, but that we have entered into competition with those trades where too much competition already exists. We should never have allowed smart young pickpockets to compete with poor sempstresses, whose ranks are already overcrowded. There will always be plenty of honest people descending in the social scale to do underpaid work, and there are thousands of petty thieves who are not fit for any other. So that there is a greater need for elevating the clever professional thief to the position of a skilled artisan.
The city bred thief class are far from being dunces or "flats," and it is not possible to make them common labourers. Many of them may very fitly be compared to the idle and dissipated "swells" of the middle and higher classes. If we took a "fast" young nobleman, for instance, and put him to some office agreeable to himself, so that he conceived a decided liking to harness, it would do him a deal more good in the way of reforming him than a course of lectures on the seventh commandment! And assuming that by so doing he enticed other "swells" to buckle on official armour, it might interfere with the prospects of some who had never been "fast," but on the whole, society would benefit by the change. I maintain that that would be the correct method to adopt with some of those thieves who are totally irreclaimable by our present system of prison discipline. With regard to the casual and petty thieves, their case is somewhat different. Many of them could not be raised above the lowest class of common labourers, but by adopting a system of individualization, that is studying each man's natural abilities, we could always arrive at the best results. It might be advanced as a third objection, that it would be impossible to make thieves pay their expenses in prison, and a fine in addition. Under our present system I admit it would be very difficult, but in the penal workshops, into which I would turn all our prisoners, this objection would not hold good. The prisoner would then be stimulated to labour at paying work agreeable to his tastes and suitable to his abilities, and the cost of his maintenance would be less than it is at present. Those who really could not earn a living in the penal workhouses, and those who would not earn their living, I would transfer to the prison for criminal incurables. I would not have any first offenders against property in prison, I would punish them as ticket-of-leave men. In the penal workshops I would only have persistent thieves. In the convict prisons only great offenders against the person and traitors. All the persistent criminals of the petty class, I would consign to the workhouses; but the character of our workhouses would require to be altered. There are three distinct classes of paupers. (1) Those who have become paupers through no fault of their own. (2) Those who have become paupers through vice; and (3) The vagrant class. I would refuse admission to the workhouse to the first class, just as I would refuse admission to the prison in the penal workshops to first offenders against property. I would treat them, on the family system of out-of-door relief, as the deserving poor. The second class I would admit into the workhouse, and the vagrant class as well, but on the understanding that they did not get out again till they had paid their bill. In short we ought to make our prisons and our workhouses paying concerns, and with the former there need be no difficulty whatever; above all we ought to keep the deserving poor from the other classes, and the regular thieves from those who have only erred once. Every man found guilty of crime who can prove that he has been working at an honest calling up to the time he committed it, should be prevented from mixing with confirmed criminals, or even from going into prison, unless for some great crime against the person for which enforced restitution would not be a sufficient atonement.