Chapter II: Part 2

In our last number, we commenced a notice of several interesting matters occurring in Boston and its vicinity, and falling within the range of our observation. The presentment of the Grand Jury of Suffolk County was under discussion, and we promised to return to it again when opportunity should allow, and this promise we now redeem.

The establishment of “an _intermediate reform school_ for young persons, who are committed for first offences, when there is an apparent opportunity for their reformation by the use of moral and intellectual discipline,” is strongly urged in the presentment. The Grand Jury have in view a plan, “where the mark of the penitentiary shall not be put upon the convicts, but where, by judicious management on the part of superintendent, and exemplary conduct on the part of those consigned to his charge--they whose misfortune it may be to stray from the paths of rectitude, could again be received into the bosom of society without reproach.”

To enforce their suggestions, they call into view “the large number of minors that have been brought before the tribunals of public justice within the six months last past,” and express their deep conviction that “if some plan were provided, at which neglected children could be made to pass their time, instead of upon the wharves, in the streets, around the doors of theatres, or in the market places,--say in some industrial school provided by the State,--juvenile delinquency would very much decrease.”

These are all very good notions for a Boston jury, or any other jury to entertain, but suppose we should transform all these jurymen into Legislators, and give them a seat in the House of Representatives; and suppose a proposition were submitted to enact a law, making it compulsory on all parents to give their children a certain amount of schooling every year, and in default thereof, authorizing and requiring the proper authorities to remove such children from the custody of the parents, for the purpose of schooling them. Would they then and there take the same view of the subject? Would no misgivings arise about the bearing which their advocacy of such a stringent law might have on their political prospects? Would they advance as directly and as boldly to the application of the remedy as they do to the exposure of the evil?

It is obvious from the language of the report, that the Suffolk Grand Jury have a much clearer idea of the disease than they have of the cure. The class of persons to whom they refer as “committed for first offences” are nevertheless “convicts,” and nothing can remove the “mark of the penitentiary” but an executive pardon. And whether there is “an apparent opportunity for their reformation,” is not an easy question to determine. When the distinction comes to be practically applied, it would be found very perplexing. Our Houses of Refuge are intended to receive those who have entered, or are just entering upon a course of life, which ordinarily ends in the penitentiary; and they have doubtless saved scores of youth from the convict’s infamous doom, and returned them to their families and to society, with every prospect of usefulness and respectability. And we had supposed that the State Reform School at Westborough, which has been so successfully conducted, was designed to answer exactly this end. The boys who are committed there, are generally sent for first offences, and the discipline is strictly reformatory. Does the report of the jury then contemplate an institution between the Reform School and the State Penitentiary, or between the Reform School and “the House of Reformation for Juvenile Offenders,” at South Boston? If the former, what ends are expected to be answered, which the institution at Westborough fails to accomplish; and if the latter, what class of offenders would they find between those at Westborough and those at South Boston, for whose case neither of these establishments provides?

However obscure the intimations of the report may be on this point, they are very clear on another, viz., that juvenile delinquency would be greatly diminished if all idle, loitering, loafing children “about town” were put to good, industrial schools. It is not a whit more certain, that if the Cochituate pond were to dry up suddenly, Boston would have a far less generous supply of water than it has now. But how shall this abstraction from the streets and wharves, of the filthy, foul-mouthed, ragged urchins be brought about? When and where shall the industrial school be established? What shall be the nature of the discipline, and the length of the confinement? Shall the public support them, or shall contributions be levied on negligent parents? Such schools have been greatly prospered, we know, in some of the chief towns of England and Scotland; but the institutions of society and indeed its whole structure, will allow that to be done there, which would not be tolerated here. We must give our Boston friends credit, however, for a very wise and effective step towards the suppression of juvenile vice. We allude to the law for the correction of truancy, and we cannot more usefully occupy a page of our limited space than by transcribing one or two passages from a leading document on the subject. The views expressed are quite as appropriate to Philadelphia as to Boston.

As early as 1846, a report came from the school committee of the
city, in which the mischief of truancy is represented as not only
interfering greatly with the regular process of instruction, but as
exerting a demoralising effect which can hardly be counteracted,
and employs much of the time and energy of the masters in
preserving the discipline which it assails. Nor is it an evil (says
the report) which ends with the schools. If it did, our duty would
still require of us to do whatever we can do for its suppression or
diminution. But it is certain, that, from the juvenile depravity of
which the truancy of the school is both a sign and a cause, grows
a large part of the suffering and crime of society. It is rare to
find in our prisons those who were well cared for as children,
and trained in regular habits of useful industry. An active child
can be kept out of evil only by giving him something good to do;
and when idleness has thoroughly corrupted the earliest years of
life, what can we expect from riper years, but a maturity of vice,
greater as temptations become stronger, and opportunities for crime
are enlarged?

In the worst cases, the truancy of the children, or their entire
absence from school, is permitted by the parents, and sometimes
caused by their desire to share in those wretched gains of debasing
or dishonest pursuits, for which after-time will exact a fearful
price.

If the law on the one hand, provides schools to which all the
children of this city _may_ go, on the other it provides another
institution to which certain children may be _made to go_. Here
then are institutions for those who _will_, and for those who
_will not_ be instructed; and under one or other of these classes
all our children may be arranged. The 143d chapter of the Revised
Statutes, Sect. 5th, enumerates among those who may be sent to the
House of Correction, “stubborn children;” and the “Act concerning
juvenile offenders in the City of Boston,” authorizes the City
Council to establish a building for “the reception, instruction,
employment and reformation of such juvenile offenders as are
hereinafter named;” this building we have: and the third section
of the same Act provides, “That any Justice or Judge of the said
Courts, (the Supreme Court, Municipal Court, and Police Courts) on
the application of the Mayor, or of any Aldermen of the City of
Boston, or of any Director of the House of Industry, or House of
Reformation, or of any Overseer of the Poor, of said City, shall
have power to sentence to said house of employment and reformation,
all children who live an idle and dissolute life, whose parents are
dead, or if living, from drunkenness, or other vices, neglect to
provide any suitable employment, or exercise any salutary control
over said children.” And the sixth section provides that any child
committed to the House of Correction, may be transferred to the
House of Employment and Reformation.”

It would seem, therefore, that the framers of the laws have done
enough, if they who are entrusted with the execution of the laws do
their duty.

These statements and views were not without their effect, though measures of reform were not matured until 1850, when a law was past, which we copy entire as the shortest method of presenting the whole matter to the view of our readers.

“AN ACT CONCERNING TRUANT CHILDREN AND ABSENTEES FROM SCHOOL.”

1. Each of the several cities and towns in this Commonwealth,
is authorized and empowered to make all needful provisions and
arrangements concerning habitual truants and children not attending
school, without any regular and lawful occupation, growing up in
ignorance, between the ages of six and fifteen years; and also,
all such ordinances and by-laws respecting such children, as shall
be deemed most conducive to their welfare, and the good order of
such city or town; and there shall be annexed to such ordinances,
suitable penalties, not exceeding for any one breach, a fine of
twenty dollars: _provided_, that said ordinances and by-laws shall
be approved by the Court of Common Pleas for the county, and shall
not be repugnant to laws of the commonwealth.

2. The several cities and towns, availing themselves of the
provisions of this act, shall appoint, at the annual meetings of
said towns, or annually by the mayor and aldermen of said cities,
three or more persons, who alone shall be authorized to make the
complaints, in every case of violation of said ordinances or
by-laws, to the justice of the peace, or other judicial officer,
who, by said ordinances, shall have jurisdiction in the matter,
which persons, thus appointed, shall have authority to carry into
execution the judgments of said justices of the peace, or other
judicial officer.

3. The said justices of the peace, or other judicial officers,
shall, in all cases, at their discretion, in place of the fine
aforesaid, be authorized to order children, proved before them to
be growing up in truancy, and without the benefit of the education
provided for them by law, to be placed, for such periods of time
as they may judge expedient, in such institution of instruction
or house of reformation, or other suitable situation, as may be
assigned or provided for the purpose, under the authority conveyed
by the first section, in each city or town availing itself of the
powers herein granted.

ORDINANCE OF THE CITY OF BOSTON.

_Sect. 1._ The city of Boston hereby adopts the two hundred and
ninety-fourth chapter of the laws of the commonwealth, for the year
one thousand eight hundred and fifty, entitled “an act concerning
truant children and absentees from school,” and avails itself of
the provisions of the same.

_Sect. 2._ Any of the persons described in the first section
of said act, upon conviction of any offence therein described,
shall be punished by a fine not exceeding twenty dollars; and the
senior justice, by appointment of the police court, shall have
jurisdiction of the offences set forth in said act.

_Sect. 3._ The house for the employment and reformation of juvenile
offenders, is hereby assigned and provided as the institution of
instruction, house of reformation, or suitable situation, mentioned
in the third section of said act.

We understand that this wholesome law was put in active operation at once in the city of Boston and in the adjoining town of Roxbury, and that a faithful execution of it bids fair to correct the hideous public nuisance of truant children. We wish it were practicable to secure similar legislation in our city. No indolent, thoughtless farmer ever stood on the borders of his field, and witnessed the broad-cast dispersion of Canada thistle-down over every part of it, with more composure than our lawmakers and magistracy look upon the spread of juvenile corruption in Philadelphia. We say this not without a grateful sense of the late liberality of the legislature in granting $60,000 towards the erection of a new Refuge in Philadelphia; nor without a just appreciation of the results of the labours of that excellent institution; nor without taking into view the various agencies designed to accomplish similar objects. But upon the mass of juvenile waywardness and depravity, they seem scarcely to have made a perceptible impression. The accumulation of the material out of which convicts are made is not sensibly checked. The sources of this corruption have been laid open to view in the reports of our Houses of Refuge, our Magdalen Asylums and police reports, but they remain as numerous and as prolific as ever. Corrupt places of amusement are thronged by boys and girls. Our eligible schools are open to them in vain. The hawking of newspapers, occasional jobs at the steamboat wharves or depots and chance-errands in the market-place, afford them means of vicious indulgence; and the regular service of an apprenticeship to some useful business, with the wholesome restraints which were formerly involved in this relation, are too irksome for their impatient spirits. Boys and girls of twelve or fifteen years of age, in a majority of cases, choose their own pursuits, receive the whole or a part of their earnings, to be expended at their pleasure; and with these elements of independence it is not difficult to connect a contempt for all authority, parental and magisterial, and this soon breaks up the foundations of society. Then there is that still unabated nuisance of young girls going about with fruit and candy; and by their very manner of life exciting, if not soliciting heartless wretches to make them their frequent or future prey. Is our community doomed to stand quietly by and see these streams of social corruption rising and swelling? Is there no arm long enough and strong enough to reach the fountain and check, if not suppress, its issues?

We have given so much space to this topic of the report, that we must be satisfied with but a brief notice of the rest.

The State Prison at Charlestown, of which _Henry K. Frothingham_ is warden, contains 476 prisoners, one-third of whom are foreigners. Six deaths occurred during the year, and the average number on the sick list was six. Libraries are highly commended as a means of moral culture, and it is recommended that they be furnished at the expense of the Commonwealth, not only to the State prison, but to county gaols and houses of correction.

The stinted supply of water at the Charlestown prison is mentioned as an evil, and it is a very expensive one too, inasmuch as it was procured during part of the summer, at an expense of from two to five dollars a day!

In the county gaol there were received between November 1, 1850, and November 1, 1851, 5,541 prisoners, of both sexes, 3,135 of whom were foreigners. The daily average was 120. The Grand Jury think that the Commonwealth’s witnesses should receive as good fare while in prison, as they would be likely to receive at home. Whereas, they now are served with the same food that convicts receive. Whether this is not quite as good as most honest poor men can afford, does not appear.

In the Alms House at Deer Island during the six months ending December 1, 1851, 931 paupers were received, of whom 686 were foreigners. Of the whole number, 33 were males, and 398 females, and 203 were under 12 years of age. The number of deaths in the same period was 77. There is a loud complaint here also, that the supply of water is inadequate. No trifling defect in such an establishment.

The Grand Jury advert to the intolerable nuisance of bawdy houses, and suggest the expediency of a law, making the owners of such houses responsible for the use which is made of their premises. There is also a distinct reference in the report to the great disparity of punishments for similar offences, and the evil consequences which attend it--a subject to which we have more than once invited and urged attention.

The erection of the new County Jail in Boston, is such an important movement in the prison-world, and the structure and occupants present so many interesting topics of remark, that we must make it the subject of a distinct article.

ART. IV.--INSANE CONVICTS.

We cannot refrain from calling the attention of our readers to the continued postponement of measures for the safe custody and proper treatment of insane convicts. In the last report (January 1, 1852,) of the inspectors of the Eastern State Penitentiary, the following passage occurs:

If mental alienation in a prisoner renders his enlargement in
society dangerous to its peace and safety, then that imprisonment
is best which partakes of the nature rather of restraint, than
punishment. There are in the Penitentiary some prisoners who,
insane on admission, require now only restraints and proper
treatment for their mental disease.

With these views, the Board of Inspectors would respectfully
suggest that the legislature would provide by law for the removal
of such cases to the State Lunatic Asylum. In that institution,
established for the treatment of mental disease, the prisoner who
ought from prudential reasons, to be restrained from society, could
be subjected to remedial discipline, if not cure.

By the report of the warden it would appear, that he has no expectation of more than a partial relief from this quarter. His language is:

By information derived from the public prints and other sources,
the State Asylum at Harrisburg would appear to be designed as
a hospital for the cure of the insane, to the exclusion of the
_hopeless_ sufferers from this distressing malady, who may offend
against the laws: thereby leaving us still to be the recipients and
guardians of these unhappy people.

If such be the case, I would earnestly inquire whether the subject
should not be at once so understood, and suitable arrangements for
their comfort and security be immediately made, under the sanction
of legislative aid and authority.

One of the physicians in allusion to this topic, calls attention to the fact that “much of the mortality is composed of prisoners, who, first go deranged, and then, like Bajazet, literally dash out their brains against the bars of their cage.”[3]

When will this terrible cruelty end? he asks. I had hoped that
the remedy was at hand, but I regret to learn that the prospect
of transferring our insane to the Stale Asylum seems as yet far
distant. In their behalf, however, I shall make a last appeal. In
the name of justice and mercy, let it be no longer necessary for
the friends of the institution to deplore, or in the power of its
opponents to boast that a number of helpless lunatics are immured
within the cells of the Eastern Penitentiary.

And the other dilates upon the subject in the following terms:

For many years past, I find representations have been made to the
Board by my predecessors, urging the propriety and the necessity
almost, of removing the insane confined in this institution.
I must record my testimony also.--The evil is unabated, and I
cannot consistently with my duty as physician, nor with my own
personal feelings, pass by this matter without at least doing
the little I may be able to have it remedied. Heretofore there
have been difficulties in the way, which happily exist no longer.
The completion of a State Lunatic Asylum, it is to be hoped, has
removed the last obstacle to a course already long approved of by
every one, and urgently demanded by all the material and moral
circumstances concerned in the case. For the object of prisons,
if I understand it, is the punishment and prevention of crime,
and, possibly the reformation of criminals. But the mischief that
irresponsibles may do, is not crime, nor are they criminals: they
may be restrained, but not punished. We punish and endeavor to
reform the criminal, the imbecile and insane, we confine sometimes,
but at all times, should endeavor to protect, to foster, to cure.
It may often be very proper, in regard to these, to turn their
hospital into a temporary prison, but it can hardly be deemed
compatible with the objects and discipline, or the material
arrangements and accommodations of penitentiaries, to make them
serve the double purpose of prison and hospital--confounding in a
common receptacle those that society ought to protect, and those it
is obliged to punish.

At the present time, we have a number of these unfortunates in
a truly pitiable condition; and it is not only with a painful,
but also with a mortifying and humiliating feeling, that we are
continually obliged to reflect, that it is not in our power to
improve it.

Turning from the State Penitentiary to the State Hospital, we are met with the following passage in the first annual report of the trustees:

“There are at the present time in the State penitentiaries, and
in the different jails of the commonwealth, a considerable number
of insane,--alleged criminals--who ought to be transferred to
the State hospital as soon as its buildings are completed. There
are also in these institutions a few, who, from their peculiarly
dangerous character, and the utter hopelessness of benefiting
them by treatment, can never with propriety become inmates of the
hospital. To protect the community and the ordinary insane from the
dangerous propensities of these individuals, it would be necessary
to introduce into our wards, intended for the treatment of disease,
all the most repulsive features of a prison, or that a separate
building, having strictly a prison character, should be erected
upon the grounds. Some legislation will be required before any of
these cases can be admitted, and some mode of proceeding should be
adopted which will prevent any but proper cases being received from
these sources.”

It is obvious that different constructions are put upon the language of the report of the trustees, by the different officers of the penitentiary. The inspectors evidently regard the State Lunatic Asylum as the proper place to which insane prisoners should be removed, whether for safe keeping or for treatment. The warden apprehends, that one class of the insane convicts would be received at the State Hospital, though the other may be excluded. Dr. Given regards the prospect of transferring any of them as far distant, while Dr. Lassiter thinks the completion of the hospital has disposed of the last obstacle to the removal of all.

If we understand the language of the trustees, it admits that a considerable number of “ordinarily” insane persons now in our State Penitentiary and in the different jails, ought to be transferred to the hospital as soon as it is so far completed as to secure them; while they maintain that there is another class of insane prisoners of “dangerous propensities,” who ought not to be received into any hospital, but for whom a separate building should be provided, on the grounds belonging to the State institution, entirely distinct from it, though doubtless under the same supervision and attendance with the main hospital.

In giving this construction to the passage, we assume that the phrase “_any of these cases_” in the last clause, is limited to the dangerous and hopeless class, who can never with propriety become inmates of a general hospital.

An insane man, whether a convict or not, must always be an object of deep sympathy. Whatever guilt attaches to him, we lose sight of it in the terrible calamity by which he is overwhelmed. The moment it becomes manifest that he has, through the visitation of God, lost the control of his intellectual faculties, so as to be exempt from the ordinary responsibilities of a reasonable being, all his relations to society are changed. The government which stood ready to charge home his guilt and demand his punishment as an offender, offers him protection and sympathy as a sufferer. The sword of justice is converted into a sceptre of mercy, and so long as this dark cloud overshadows him, the voice of the accuser is silent.

We apprehend there would be much difficulty in distinguishing practically between those insane convicts, who might be received into the State Hospital as ordinary patients, and those who would require to be kept by themselves. So far as the safe custody of the dangerous class is concerned, the number would seem to be too small to justify the expense of “a separate building, (having strictly a prison character,) erected upon the (hospital) grounds,” as the trustees suggest. No class of prisoners are more ingenious or more untiring in their efforts to escape than the insane; and hence their safe keeping would be the chief point of consideration in the construction of a building for their reception. If separate provision is not made for all classes of insane convicts, we should much question the expediency of making it simply for the safe keeping of the dangerous. We would rather ameliorate, as far as possible, their condition as convicts in the cell, affording them extra diet, appropriate association, amusement, &c. Nothing would be gained by transferring them from a cell in Philadelphia to a cell in Harrisburg, provided they are to be strictly confined to either; and any relaxation of this rigor which their convalescence might warrant, would be attended with much less hazard in the prison-yard, than on the hospital grounds.

But we have serious doubts, whether a general State Lunatic Hospital should receive convicts of any class. We are aware, that the practice obtains to some extent, but whether, in a majority of cases, the parties received can be properly called convicts, there is much ground to question.

In the report of the New York State Lunatic Asylum, for 1851, we notice ten cases returned under the head of “imprisonment,” eight of which are declared to be cases of “feigned insanity,” and of course though “convicts,” they were not “insane.” Of the other two, one became insane before trial, and was of course, though insane, never properly a “convict.” “Besides these ten,” says the report, “there have been sent to us from prisons and gaols several others, who were cases of genuine insanity, but who were doubtless insane when committed.” Then they were never proper subjects of penal suffering, and should not have been imprisoned, except for safe keeping. In most of our State hospitals pay-patients are received to some extent, and those who resort to them as institutions of charity, should not be forced into discreditable association. It is of great importance, that every thing attractive should be presented in them, and every thing repulsive avoided. The poverty-stricken are sometimes quite sensitive on these subjects, and it is as inhuman as it is impolitic to violate their feelings.

The attention of the British Parliament has been recently called to this subject by a proposition of the commissioners of lunacy, to establish a central asylum for “criminal lunatics” in England and Wales, similar in character to that for Ireland, at Dundrum, near Dublin. The commissioners say, that “it has been frequently brought under their notice, that the friends and relatives of patients, and also the patients themselves, when conscious of being associated with “criminal lunatics,” have considered such association a great and unnecessary aggravation of their calamity.” There is some doubt expressed, whether such feelings prevail to any considerable extent in institutions where convict-patients are received; and to the question, whether the dislike to the society of criminal lunatics ascribed to patients and their friends, exists generally or only in those cases which were brought specifically under the notice of the commissioners, one medical witness says, that his own experience is directly the reverse; that he has carefully watched, in order to detect any repugnance or unfriendly feeling among the inmates of a county asylum, of which he has charge, towards their fellow-patients, who were known to have committed offences against the laws, and had not only failed to do so, but had heard expressions of sympathy and pity. He thinks there is much more tenderness felt for them by their fellow sufferers, than by their sane neighbors.

There is also a considerable difference of opinion, not only as to the classes of lunatics which the proposed asylum should receive, but also as to the name both of place and patients. Some would call it the State asylum, and would open it to all criminal offenders of every station and degree, who are exempted from the penalties of the law on the ground of insanity. Of course it would have the character of a general, and not of a pauper asylum, so as to afford superior accommodation for those who could afford to pay. Others would confine the use of such an asylum to the detention and treatment of all lunatics of criminal disposition, whether they have actually committed a crime or not. Some would completely separate criminals who have become insane after conviction, from those who have committed crimes under the influence of insanity--the former, of whom only would be properly called insane convicts. The distinction is obvious, viz., that an insane person cannot become a convict, though a convict may become insane. Others would make no distinction, but would put “all lunatics detained under warrant from the government, on the same footing.”

The discussion of the matter has awakened parliamentary inquiry. On the 18th of March last, in the House of Lords, the Earl of Shaftsbury moved an address to the Crown, touching “the expediency of establishing a State asylum for the care and custody of those who are denominated criminal lunatics,” and he adduced several facts, to show the inexpediency of detaining criminal lunatics in the same asylum with other patients.

The Earl of Derby thought any movement in this direction would be premature, as a revision of the whole subject was needful, before it could be determined what new legislation would be expedient.

Lord Cranworth said, that nothing could be more mischievous than mixing criminal lunatics with other lunatics; and he also contended that the question of lunacy in criminal prosecutions, should not be determined by juries; but that the only point for them to decide, should be the fact--guilty, or not guilty--leaving the question of sanity to be inquired into before another tribunal, the constitution of which he was not then prepared to define.

On an assurance from Lord Derby that the subject should receive deliberate consideration, the motion was withdrawn.

As it seems unlikely that any provision will be presently made in our State Hospital, either for convicts who become insane, or who manifest insanity after they are received, or for those who were insane when received, but were committed as convicts, or for those who are committed for safe keeping merely, or as lunatics with criminal intentions, or propensities, we will venture to suggest a more minute classification of the register of prisoners, and some specific recognition of these classes in the arrangements of the Eastern Penitentiary.

If that institution is to serve the double purpose of a penitentiary for convicts, and a house of detention or hospital for lunatics of dangerous or criminal tendencies, let the departments be kept distinct, and each be furnished with such attendance, supervision, &c., as their circumstances require. This arrangement would very nearly resemble that at the Blockley Almshouse, under which the two thousand paupers are received and provided for in the appropriate wards of the house, while the two or three hundred lunatics of various classes have a distinct department, though all are under the same general superintendence.

So in the reports, the same distinction would be made between the convicts proper, who are undergoing the process of punishment, and those who from alienation of mind, antecedent or subsequent to their reception as prisoners, are not proper subjects of penal suffering, though they are proper subjects of personal restraint, and, as such, have a lodging within the prison walls. In a word, if our penitentiary must be used for the detention or custody of lunatics whatever their character or grade, let it have due credit as a hospital, and not suffer undeserved reproach as a penitentiary.

ART. V.--FINAL REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE ERECTION OF THE NEW GAOL FOR SUFFOLK COUNTY (MASS.), pp. 44.

This document was presented, not long since, to the authorities of the City of Boston; and, as it gives us the history of a prison structure quite unique, in some respects, we think our readers will be interested in a brief notice of it.

The County of Suffolk is made up of the City of Boston, with a population of 140,000, and the town of Chelsea, with a population of 7,000. The County Gaol, situated in Leverett street, in the heart of the city, was, for almost twenty years, the subject of complaint. It was irremediably defective in construction, and incapable of being warmed or ventilated, and afforded no means of classification. The site of it was ill adapted to the purpose. It embraced 4800 square feet of land, valued at $1.50 or $2.00 a foot.

In July, 1845, a plan of a new gaol, to be erected at South Boston, was presented, and an order passed to proceed with the work; but the people in the vicinity objecting to the measure, it was not prosecuted farther; and nothing more was done till, at the beginning of 1847, a letter[4] was addressed to the city authorities by Mr. George Sumner, then in Paris, earnestly remonstrating against the adoption of the associate or Auburn system of discipline, and urging the construction of a County Prison on the separate plan. The next year, it was determined to rebuild on Leverett street; but before the work was commenced a proposition was submitted for the purchase of an eligible site on the margin of Charles river, which was adopted; a purchase of nearly 200,000 superficial feet was made, at a cost (with filling up, enclosing and protecting), of a fraction less than $179,000; and a plan of construction agreed upon. From this time the work went bravely on, till its completion, on the 25th day of November last, when the prisoners were transferred from the old gaol, in Leverett street, to their new quarters.

The cost of the building, exclusive of site, is a little short of $200,000--the total expense being $373,525.90.

There is a centre octagonal building, with four wings--three of which contain the cells--and the fourth is taken up by the officers’ apartments. Each of the north and south wings measures 80 feet 6 inches in length, and 55 feet in width, and 56 feet in height above the surface of the ground, and is divided into five stories, each story containing ten cells, thus giving to each of these two wings 50 cells. The east wing measures 164 feet 6 inches in length; 55 feet in width, and 56 feet in height above the surface of the ground, divided into five stories, each with 24 cells, thus giving to this wing 120 cells. The cells in all the wings are 8 by 11 feet, and 10 feet high. The hospital and chapel occupy the fourth story of the west, or officers’ wing. Each cell contains a window and a door; and the interior of the whole prison is lighted from 28 windows in the outer walls, each 10 feet wide and 33½ feet in length. The lower apartment of the centre octagonal building contains the kitchen, bakery and laundry, and in the upper is the central guard and inspecting room. This apartment is 76⅓ feet square, and stretches upward to the roof, in a clear, unoccupied space of 83⅔d feet above the surface of the ground! The exterior walls of the prison are of Quincy granite.

The opportunity was afforded us, some few days since, to take a general view of this new and imposing structure. At the time we were there workmen were engaged in erecting a new furnace--the method of warming the cells having proved quite inadequate. One might have supposed that this branch of the science of prison architecture was sufficiently understood to prevent such a disappointment. The inmates of the prison were evidently suffering from this defect.

The _Separate System_ is strictly enforced, except that no labor is introduced, the prison being chiefly a house of detention for debtors, witnesses and untried prisoners, upon whom labor or other prison service may not be enforced. Thirty or forty convicts were there, but under sentences so short as to render it unprofitable to put them to work. Many were committed for non-payment of fine and costs. The debtors have a separate ward, as have also females and minors. Among the most obvious and important deficiencies may be mentioned that of water. Tubs and cans are used in the cells. The rates allowed for the board of witnesses are liberal, and an instance was mentioned to us of a case so unimportant that the defendant was bailed in the sum of only $30, while several witnesses were then in confinement at the rate of $2.25 per week for their board!

Whoever forms a judgment of the new gaol for Suffolk County from the description in the Report of the Committee, will find much cause to modify it upon a view of the premises; and if we were not misinformed by resident officials, the structure fails, in some very important particulars, to answer the purpose which its projectors had in view. Some attribute its defects to the unsteady counsels that presided over its erection, and others to radical errors in the plan. As it has great advantages over the old gaol, however, we are disposed to consider it a step in advance, though certainly a very costly one.

Miscellaneous Notices.

FOREIGN.

CRIME AND PAUPERISM COUNTERACTED.

“It is a trite argument now, that the reformation of one child,
while it is far more hopeful than the reclamation of one old
offender, is many degrees cheaper than the punishment of that one.
Experience proves that there is scarcely a single case out of a
thousand where the incipient disease of vice has not yielded to
the ameliorating treatment of kindness, and the removal of the
cause--poverty. Cheaper; because directly diminishing pauperism,
it, in the first place, reduces the amount we, as a community, pay
for its support; cheaper, because trying, catching and punishing
one criminal, costs, in some cases, an amount equal to the whole
annual expense to feed, clothe, and instruct a school-full of
those who are to be prevented, by a simple process, from becoming
criminals; and cheaper, in this far higher sense, that the
reformation of one individual infinitely more than counterbalances
the expense of attempts, even where ineffectual, at reforming many.”

Let the doubter of these positions call at some school where the lowest order of human kind finds shelter, food and friends. We have seen such an one--in the old country. We will introduce our readers to one of its pupils:

He enters through a play-yard, where half a dozen little fellows,
not very fashionable, though quite decent in their attire, are
amusing themselves with tops and balls, and, if noise is a test
of comfort, they are very happy. Ascending an outside stair,
he turns into a somewhat spacious apartment. The roof indeed is
not lathed and plastered, but there is all the more ventilation.
Everywhere, although things are homely enough, there is an air of
perfect cleanliness. Two or three excellent maps hang across and
divide the apartment, in one end of which are the boys, in the
other the girls. Let him look at either class, and what a strange
study for the physiognomist or phrenologist are the faces and
foreheads of the pupils. Some have countenances on which the traces
of very early hard life are still visible; the lines of misery are
scarcely yet effaced. There are others, free, good brows, which
give unmistakeable evidence of shrewdness and talent; but on every
face there is contentment. The teachers in both divisions are busy
at the usual lessons; but, at the stranger’s visit, the classes
are united, and an exercise is gone through by individuals of
either sex, chosen promiscuously. In the back seat there starts
up a little fellow about twelve years and a half, who, caught
half-naked, begging through the streets some fifteen months ago,
can read his Bible like the best of us; another reads a verse or
two of poetry; a third small youth, whose only occupation, till
within a year or so, was selling matches through the streets, is
proved, after trial, to be far the best speller in the place, where
there are not a few very good ones, and so on. The procedure is as
orderly, and the advancement in secular and Christian knowledge, of
these once outcast and forsaken children--now clothed and in their
right mind--is as great as in any of the best public schools; and
seems to have been _at least_ as rapid as among the children of
what are called the respectable classes of society. And now a hymn
is sung by all united, and, as they sit and sing, with folded arms
and serious looks, there is enough, whether in the whole scene, or
in the music so touchingly chanted, to send something like a tear
into the corner of the eye. This over, the ranks are marshalled,
and then pass down to the room below, where dinner waits; and,
standing silently over the homely but substantial fare, a sign is
made, when every eye is closed, and grace is said aloud. Enjoying
themselves over their humble meal, our visitor leaves them, and
heartily joins us in recommending a visit to such a scene, and
inviting public attention to the principles on which these poor
children are made what they are. The leading and moving principle
is that of kindness and love--the endeavouring by all means to
win them back to trust and confidence in the kindness and love of
teachers and friends; and looking at the interests at stake, surely
we may say that these are endeavours which a Christian public _is
bound_ to second, especially when the seconding costs so little,
and is attended, as we have seen, with so great results.

If any of the readers of our Journal would see this same wise and humane policy exhibited in actual life, let him visit the Foster Home, (at what is known as the Preston Retreat,) or the Children’s Home in Moyamensing, and he will see how much seasonable care and kindness will do, towards counteracting the downward tendencies of poverty and social corruption. The following stanzas happily express the grand idea of social reformation.

SPEAK TO HIM KINDLY.

Oh! speak to him kindly--the boy has a heart,
Pray think, ere you bid him in anger depart;
His tatters and rags will not darken your door;
Perhaps its not _his_ fault he’s dirty and poor!
Would you wonder to find him a rogue or a fool,
With Distress for his master--the Street for his school?--
Some feeling of pride in his bosom may beat,
Though he stands at your door without shoes to his feet.

Do you question his story, and turn on your heel?
_Starvation_ can teach him to beg and to steal;
Would you drive him to pilfer by scorn and rebuke?
Oh! a beggar has virtues as well as a duke.
Remember a man’s not the wisest and best
Because of the star that may shine on his breast:
The poorest on earth may nobility own,
And a king be a villain in spite of his throne!

Yes! there’s found in the garret again and again
A power that softens e’en poverty’s chain;
A spirit of honest endurance, that brings
More comfort than throbs in the bosoms of kings.
Then turn not away from that fatherless boy--
His soul is not dead to the feeling of joy;
A kind word on his path like the sunshine will fall,
And his dull eye light up to repay you for all.

Oh! treat him not harshly--but win if you can;
The boy in his rags will one day be a man!
That urchin before you--so haggard and pale
May live in a workhouse, or die in a jail!
But virtue and truth may be found in him still.
Then turn not aside--you may save if you will:
Can you leave him to grow up a knave or a sot,
With a home or a school not a mile from the spot?

Then speak to him kindly--’twill cost you no more--
Oh, drive him not hungry away from your door!
But give him, in pity, a morsel to eat,
A coat for his back, and some shoes for his feet.
The humble though homeless by Jesus are prized,
Remember that He was both poor and despised--
And oh! think on his words, ere impatient you be,
“_Inasmuch as ye did it to these, ’twas to Me._”

NOVEL RESIDENCE OF A DEN OF YOUNG THIEVES.--From a late London paper, we take the following remarkable sketch of the rendezvous of a gang of juvenile depredators. We have some such domicils, and some such tenants of them, in our own cities.

Five ragged and filthy boys were charged with trespassing on
property belonging to the South Western Railway Company. An
officer stated, that at three o’clock, on the preceding morning,
he examined the arches under the terminus of the South Western
Railway, and observed a hole, capable of admitting a man’s body in
one of them, situated in Granby street. On looking through this
aperture he discovered the prisoners, some of whom had pipes in
their mouths, smoking, while others were talking and laughing;
and all seemed as if they were perfectly secure from discovery in
their hiding place. The moment he threw light upon the groups, they
all started upon their feet, but the arch being enclosed on all
sides, they had no opportunity of escape, and were secured without
difficulty. They had worked holes, and undermined the arch in
several places. In a hole, covered with a piece of board, he found
small parcels of coffee, sugar, pepper, candles, &c. There was
also a quantity of coals, and straw covered a portion of the ground.

The magistrate then asked the witness if he knew the prisoners? The
officer said that they had all been convicted of petty offences.
The officer of the South Western Railway said that a number of
their companions were convicted some time ago for a similar
offence, and that it cost the Company £75 to repair the arch which
they damaged by taking up their quarters in it! Seventy-five pounds
expended in good schooling, would have gone far towards making good
boys of them.

They were sentenced to imprisonment for various terms, from 25 to
40 days--probably to come out ten-fold more the children of evil
than when they went in.

CASES OF THEFT AT A SINGLE TERM ON PERTH CIRCUIT, SCOTLAND.

_No._ _Articles Stolen._ _Previous Convictions._ _Sentence._
1 A tub, 4 (1 in Justiciary) 10 years trans.
2 A pail, 5 (1 in Justiciary) 10 “
3 A purse, with 5_s._ 4 (1 in Justiciary) 10 “
4 Purse, with 1_s._ 8½_d._, and trinkets, 2 7 “
5 Silver watch and appendages, 3 7 “
6 10 lbs. lead, 4 7 “
7 Jacket, vest, cap, and boots, 3 7 “
8 Jar, pepper-box, and 2_s._ 6_d._ 2 7 “
9 Gown and pair of shoes, 5 (1 in Justiciary) 10 “
10 Quantity of soap, (1 in Justiciary) outlawed.

_Note._--The value of the articles stolen may not in all exceed £5;
there were 33 previous convictions, of which _five_ were by the
Circuit Court of Justiciary.

The investigations and trials of these ten persons must have cost
the country at least £1000, which would have thoroughly educated in
an Industrial School 200 children.

SINGULAR ASSOCIATION.--Lord Campbell tells us that he once heard
a judge at Stafford sentencing a prisoner convicted of uttering a
forged £1 note, and after having pointed out to him the enormity
of the offence, and exhorted him to prepare for another world, the
dignitary thus concluded:--“And I trust that, through the merits
and mediation of our blessed Redeemer, you may there experience
that mercy which a due regard to the credit of the paper currency
of the country forbids you to hope for here.”

FRIENDLY BENEFICIAL SOCIETIES.--There are 14,000 enrolled Friendly
Societies in England, having 1,600,000 members, an annual
revenue amounting to £2,800,000, and an accumulated capital of
£6,400,000. A still greater number of minor Friendly Societies are
not enrolled, and do not, therefore, possess the privileges and
means of self-protection enjoyed by the former. It is estimated
that there are 33,223 societies in this position in England,
Wales, Scotland, and Ireland; having 3,052,000 members, an annual
revenue of £4,980,000, and with funds amounting to so large a
sum as £11,360,000, the praiseworthy accumulations of the purely
industrial classes. Indeed, half of the laboring male adult
population are members of beneficial societies.

DIMINISHED PAUPERISM.--It appears from a late return presented
by Mr. Baines, to the House of Commons, that there are well-nigh
26,000 fewer adult able-bodied paupers in the workhouses of
England than at the corresponding period of last year. Of paupers,
generally, no matter what their sex or age, the diminution is
somewhat more than 56,000.

INTEMPERANCE AND INSANITY.--From an article in the Scottish
Temperance Review, it appears that returns from 25 Lunatic Asylums
give 24 per cent. of cases, caused by intemperance and vice. The
total number of lunatics in England and Wales is estimated at
26,516. Of these, 6,629 were reduced to their lamentable condition
by intemperance. The sum expended in England and Wales, for the
maintenance of the insane, exceeds $3,500,000.

METROPOLITAN MORTALITY.--From a very interesting and carefully
compiled statistical table, published in the London _Medical
Times and Gazette_, on the births and deaths in the Metropolis
during the past year, it appears, that the number of births was,
39,882 males, and 37,984 females, being a total of 77,866, or
an excess of males over females of 1,898. The number of deaths
during the same period was 28,096 males, and 27,249 females, or
a total number of 55,345 deaths, being an excess of deaths of
males over females of 847, or an excess of births over deaths
of 22,517. The ages at death were from 0 to 15, 25,712; from 15
to 60, 17,999; and from 60 and upwards, 11,362. The proportion
of deaths, in 1851, to population in the several districts of
London, will be seen by the following:--In the west districts, the
population by the last census was 376,427, and the deaths in 1851
were 8,326; giving a proportion of one death to 45.2 inhabitants.
In the north district, population 490,396; deaths 10,860; or one
death to 45.1 inhabitants. In the central district, population
393,256; deaths 9.474; or one death to 41.1 inhabitants. In the
east districts, population 485,522; deaths 11,819; or one death to
41.1 inhabitants. And in the south districts, population 616,635;
deaths 14,884; or one death to 41.4 inhabitants. By a comparison of
the above with the former year 1850, it will be observed that the
births have increased, in 1851, by 2,554, and the deaths by 6,775.
In 1850, the excess of births over deaths was 26,738; while in
1851, it was only 22,517, being a decrease of 4,221. The deaths at
the age of 0 to 15 have increased over those of 1850 by 4,341; at
the age from 15 to 60, by 1,634; and from 60 and upwards, by 780.

THE GREAT WASHED!--During 1851, there were 213,485 bathers
at the baths and washhouses establishment, situated in St.
Martin’s-in-the-Fields, London; the receipts amounted to £3,437
17_s._ 9_d._ There were 50,290 washers: the number of hours’
washing was 103,836; and the receipts under this head were £499
14_s._ 1_d._ So at “the Model,” in Whitechapel, there were during
the same period 156,310 bathers, with £2,143 7_s._ 8_d._, receipts.
There were 43,462 washers, who washed for 98,824 hours, and paid
£513 1_s._ 2_d._ Taking the Metropolis generally, which as yet
yields us reports but of five establishments, of which one was
opened on the 2nd of September, we find that during the past year,
there were 647,242 bathers, who paid in all £9,141 8_s._ 6_d._;
and 132,251 washers, who paid £1,498 19_s._ 2_d._ The sum of the
combined receipts is £10,640 7_s._ 8_d._ The country returns yield
similar results for the periods during which the establishments
have been opened to the public.

The most remarkable indication of the state of trade in Birmingham
during the past year, is to be derived from the savings of the
working classes. These are shown in various ways. The accounts of
the savings’-bank for the year 1851, although not yet published,
are made up, and it appears that during the last twelve months,
there has been an increase of 1,025 depositors, and of upwards of
£20,000 in deposits. The aggregate amount of deposits, as will be
shown by the report when it appears, is close upon £400,000. But
this is not all. There are numerous Freehold Land and Building
Societies in Birmingham, and not less than £70,000 has been paid by
the artizans of Birmingham into their various treasuries.