remarkably convenient. It is hexagonal, and divided into six departments; the governor's house being placed in the centre. In every department there is a range of airy night-cells, (in which, for the most part, the prisoners sleep singly,) a well sized court-yard, a day-room, a work-room, an apartment for the sick, and a cell for the solitary confinement of refractory prisoners. Every room in the governor's house commands a view over two of the court-yards, the consequence of which is, that these yards, and all that passes in them, are almost constantly under actual inspection. The chapel, which is in the second story of the governor's house, admits of no separation between the men and women.

Of the six divisions of this prison, one is for women, and the other five for men; the male convicts or confiners are separated from the untried prisoners; but no further classification appears to be effected. All parts of the prison are kept in a state of much neatness and cleanliness.

The prisoners meet for worship twice in the week. They are never ironed. Their allowance of food is the same as that of the prisoners in the jail.

Some attempt has been made towards the employment of the tried prisoners; but the system has at present by no means been carried into full effect. The work which has hitherto been provided is called hickling. It is a step in the manufacture of hempen cloth, by which an individual when fully employed is able to earn only threepence per day. Even of this work, however, so little is procured, that many of the convicts are doing little or nothing, and the untried prisoners are totally idle.

As this house of correction is provided with several work rooms, it is much to be lamented that all classes of the prisoners should not be fully employed. The attention of the magistrates is, at present, much directed to this important object; and there is reason to expect that by the introduction of a few looms into the prison, with the help of brush-making, shoe-making, turning, and other handicraft trades, the present deficiency will soon be reme

died.

A Committee of Ladies has been formed, with thesanction of the Lord Mayor and Aldermen of York, for the purpose of superintending the females in the two prisons which I have now described; and it may be hoped that a similar care will be extended over the male prisoners. When this object is effected, and sufficient employment provided, there will be little to prevent either of these prisons from becoming places of reform-prisons tending to the diminution of crime.

In the course of the foregoing notes on the various prisons

which we visited, it has been necessary for me, in giving a faithful narration of facts, to state some particulars disgraceful in their nature, and injurious in their consequences. In doing this, it has not been my intention to impute blame to any individual, or to any set of men. I am well aware that the subject of prison discipline, like many others of great practical importance, has not, till lately, obtained that notice, on which it has so ample a claim. Such is the frame of society, and so numerous are the avocations, in which most men are engaged, that subjects of real interest to the welfare of mankind frequently remain disregarded for a long period of time, until some prominent circumstances happen to call them into view. This has been very much the case with prison discipline, which, till of late years, has been little noticed and little understood. Howard, indeed, drew much of the public attention to our prisons, which before his time were generally the sinks of extreme misery and terrible disease. But his efforts, and the efforts which he excited in others, were directed more to the alleviation of distress than to the diminution of crime; more to the maintenance of the prisoner's health than the reformation of his morals. Undoubtedly all these objects found a place in the views of that great and enlightened philanthropist : but public sentiment on the more important points had made but little progress; and a judicious system of kind superintendence, of careful religious instruction, and of constant employment, was then but little contemplated. It is not, therefore, a subject of astonishment, that so many of our prisons are inadequate, in their present state, to the great purposes of reform.

Now, the case is widely different: the public attention is fully awake to the subject; much light has been thrown upon it, and the true principles of prison discipline are beginning to be generally understood. It is granted on all hands, that if we would diminish crimes we must give to our punishments a tendency to reform criminals; and that, in our prisons in particular, this tendency can be no otherwise promoted, than by a regular system of inspection, classification, instruction, and employment. Since such are the circumstances of the case, however we may excuse the mistakes of our predecessors, it must be allowed, that a continuance in the old system of management would be extremely culpable. As far as my observation has extended, a disposition to adhere to that system is by no means prevalent :-on the contrary, a zeal for improvement is conspicuous. To the magistrates of the towns and districts through which we passed, we are much indebted for the kindness and openness with which they received us; and the correct and benevolent views entertained by these gentlemen, as well as by most of the jailers, afford fair grounds for expectation, that a general

effort for the amelioration of their prisons will not be withheld. To these remarks may with propriety be added the following notice :

Some time since, a Society was formed in London, for the suppression of Juvenile Delinquency and the Improvement of Prison Discipline. The Committee of that Society have been indefatigable not only in procuring information respecting prisons, and in suggesting the requisite improvements, but in forming plans for the' erection of new jails to the greatest advantage and at the least possible expense. It is peculiarly desirable that those, who have it in view to erect new prisons, should avail themselves of the advice and assistance of these gentlemen, who, from motives of benevolence, have made the subject their study, and are already in possession of much experience respecting it. Any letters on this subject, addressed to Thomas Fowell Buxton, M. P. Spitalfields, or to the Committee, Samuel Hoare, jun., 62, Lombard-street, will not fail to receive at their hands a ready and early attention.

1

IMPRACTICABILITY

OF

The Resumption

OF

CASH PAYMENTS;

OF

THE SUFFICIENCY

OF A

REPRESENTATIVE CURRENCY IN THIS COUNTRY,

UNDER DUE REGULATIONS;

AND OF THE

DANGER OF A REDUCTION OF THE CIRCULATING

MEDIUM,

IN THE PRESENT STATE OF THINGS.

BY SIR WILLIAM CONGREVE, Bart. Member of Parliament for the Borough of Plymouth.

LONDON:

ADVERTISEMENT.

THE following pages must be received as containing merely an outline of certain important propositions connected with the Resumption of Cash Payments, and with the sufficiency of a Representative Circulating Medium, which are here offered more with a view to elicit consideration, than as affording complete investigation. The writer was led to the view of these subjects by having been lately employed, in a public capacity, in the solution of a vital problem connected with this important question; and, though his present limits do not allow of more detailed explanations, still he feels some confidence, from the consideration which he has given to the subject, that his principles are, in general,

correct.