last October states, that in the month of May he visited four of the outstations; that "the parties consisted of from forty to eighty men, lodged in huts. They were in charge of a warder, with one of the Royal Engineers to direct the works, and two or three convict constables to preserve order," &c. He, however, strongly deprecates the necessity of so congregating them under no efficient control, and observes "that the sooner the men can be separated after they are disembarked the better for them in every way."

We have not, however, yet done with the intermediate system. Who'd have thought it? Lord Palmerston comes out strong-save the mark! -in this, as he has done in every thing else he has engaged in.

In 1853, he suggests to Sir Joshua Jebb that it would be very desirable to place the female prisoners "in an intermediate condition between close imprisonment and discharge on license," expressing a hope "that some means might be devised for the formation of an establishment, under the control of the Government, in which they might be put under qualified restraint to occupations of industry." The possibility of forming an intermediate establishment of a less penal character than an ordinary prison, therefore, came under consideration at that date.

Next in the chain of evidence comes a letter from Sir J. Jebb to Mr. Gurney Hoare, dated 22d November 1853, proposing to carry out this plan, and avoid the disadvantages of releasing women from a Government prison, by entering into a contract with the "Refuge for the Destitute" for the reception of the female convicts prior to discharge.

I would here remark, in passing, that the Irish directors appear to have seen the wisdom of avoiding a Government establishment; for we find that, in December 1855 (see Second Report), it was proposed to the Irish Government that female convicts, whose conduct had been exemplary, should be drafted into existing private charitable institutions, the reasons assigned being "that a government institution would answer for a mere refuge, but not as a medium through which the individual will be reëstablished in society; for under any rules it will be looked upon as a prison, and on the discharge of the inmate the same difficulties will be felt as at present in our convict depôts."

There can be no doubt of the soundness of these conclusions, but we hear nothing of this in reference to Smithfield and Lusk, the two intermediate prisons for males; the difficulties have either vanished, or have been neutralised by police supervision after release. Under any circumstances, if credit is to be taken for originality, something is due on this side the Channel.

In regard to comparison, the most enthusiastic admirer of the mysteries of the Irish system, if he had ever visited the parallel institutions of Smithfield in Dublin and Fulham in Middlesex, would not be so bold as to deny the immeasurable superiority of the latter in every respect. We have seen and know how to measure its excellence.

The simple fact is, that what has been termed the Irish system may

be said to be identical with the English in its two first periods of probation; Mountjoy Prison in Dublin being an imitation of Pentonville in London, and Spike Island near Cork a somewhat questionable attempt to represent Portland. Here, however, a deviation begins, by the adoption into Ireland of the third period of the English system, which, as already explained, is only carried out fully in Western Australia.

The first question that arises in the discussion of the question is, whether a stage of partial freedom, with 50 to 100 convicts congregated together, as described at Lusk, would be likely to promote their reformation.

2d. Whether it would be expedient to exhibit the highest class of secondary punishment in a good many places in that loose form.

3d. Whether it would be expedient or possible to place every discharged prisoner under the superintendence of the police.

The English directors emphatically answer "No!" to all these questions. And so, I am bound to say, does every man of experience whom I have consulted.

They do not dispute the success in Ireland, but maintain that the circumstances are altogether different, and that any attempt to enforce the regulations established for the penal colonies would be fraught with great evil, unless the restrictions were limited to incorrigible offenders,—a measure which was strongly recommended years ago.

It is contended, that a convict who has gone through the discipline enforced in the English prisons is better fitted for discharge than if he had been removed from the higher stages of discipline and associated with others under diminished control.

Having given this outline, we shall perhaps more easily get into the interior of the subject by referring to recent reports, giving brief extracts and brief opinions upon the questions as they present themselves.

The directors of Ireland, in their last report, dated March 1861, speaking of the principles to be adopted in order to insure success, recommend, "That in order to train convicts reliably, it is necessary to operate upon them in small numbers in a form to generate the confidence of the public in the tests of character and temptation to which they have been exposed."

This has been admitted as an abstract question; but Sir Joshua Jebb, in his report for 1857, after stating that all penal inflictions must be looked at primarily in reference to "the prevention of crime," goes on to

say:

"It is my firm conviction that the Government, in giving sanction from time to time to the present carefully devised system, have gone quite as far in the way of encouragement, relaxation of discipline, and care for the prisoners' best interests during confinement, as is either expedient or necessary." He then strongly enforces the great importance of "not impairing the prestige of a sentence of penal servitude, the stern character of which it is essential to preserve as the most formidable of our secondary punishments."

It needs no argument of mine to urge the soundness of these opinions, and it appears the more desirable closely to adhere to the measures to which they refer, as any assumed benefit by a deviation would be calculated only for a very few, and the mischiefs would be widely spread among the many. It is even questioned-with reverence be it spoken-whether the intermediate training is of that "reliable" character which ought to "give confidence to the public" in the tests of character and temptation "to which they have been exposed."

Sir Joshua Jebb observes (see Report for 1857), "Those who place a value on the exercise of forbearance in withstanding little temptations, forget that the whole life of a convict is an exercise of great forbearance;" and concludes by stating an opinion which is confirmed by all the experienced prison-officers with whom I have spoken, " that all such tests with an English convict would be absolutely useless, and that the greatest hypocrite of the party would probably be the greatest gainer by them." It is generally admitted that tests, whatever they be, if applied during confinement, can only give negative results; and no one brings his opinions to bear with more effect on this precise question than Mr. Organ, the talented lecturer of the Irish intermediate prisons. He observes, speaking of the convicts who had passed through his hands: "The results of my experience amongst them in this way have long since led me to believe that a more perfect knowledge of the real character of prisoners can be acquired by close observation for the first few days after discharge, when they are free and feel themselves uncontrolled and independent, than can be derived from any experience of them whilst inmates of a gaol. My practical experience of their characters, both inside and outside the prison, convinces me that the opinion I now advance is correct.” If this be so, Cui bono?

The directors in Ireland also lay down the principle, thirdly, "that appliances for obstructing the commission of crime, and rendering justice more certain and more speedy, are most powerful adjuncts in the amendment of the criminal; and, therefore, police supervision, photography, constant communication with the governors of county gaols, and the systematic proof of former convictions against the criminal, will assuredly in any country cause the diminution of crime before any length of time can elapse." And again, they go on to say, "We cannot disconnect in our minds police supervision from any proposition which really aims at amending the criminal, proving his amendment, and reducing the criminal population."

There can be but little doubt the appliances referred to would very soon reduce to a minimum the criminal population in any country; but the necessity for bringing them into play certainly appears to imply a doubt whether amendment would be exhibited in a very striking form unless such control were exercised.

In order to afford a fair comparison of the results between England and Ireland, the means of controlling discharged prisoners should be equal in both cases. Here again, as in other respects, our friends on the other

side of the Channel have us at a great disadvantage, which they should be the first to proclaim. With reference" to favourable means of dispersion and disposal," which have ever been insisted on as essentials to success, we see "that nearly one half of the convicts discharged" from Smithfield and Lusk "during the past year have sought new fields for their honest labours in distant lands." We have done with them; no ugly percentage returns upon our hands; but what has become of those who are not inclined to honest labour either at home or abroad?

We are indebted to the candour of Mr. Organ for a clue to their whereabouts. He says, "that the system for the detection of crime is so well organised throughout the country, that the chances of escape bear little proportion to the certainty of detection;" and further on, that "thieving, as a fixed vocation, is fast on the decrease in Ireland, and the leading members of the profession are as fast disappearing from the scenes of their criminal labours. They are not to be found, with few exceptions, in our convict-gaols just now, and the few that are so located will tell you, to use their own phrase, 'the game is dead.' There is reason, however, to fear that the players are not dead too; and that the game's alive somewhere else, we know to our cost.

Paddy is not an uncalculating machine, and if the police make Ireland too hot to hold him, a very small exercise of his great intelligence will lead him to transport himself to where there is a clearer field for his vocation, and where the temperature of control is somewhat less fervid. It will be remembered that when the police was first organised in a few of the counties in England, there arose a cry from the neighbouring ones that all the rogues were driven out of one shire into another. In like manner the law of settlement causes what is called a close parish to be entirely free from pauperism and crime, the next, if an open parish, becoming the receptacle of the refuse, and having to pay for the immunity of its more fortunate neighbour. Apply these remarks to the criminal population of Ireland, who are hunted from pillar to post by a most admirably organised police: the result might have been safely predicted, for it can be conclusively proved.

Before we proceed to consider the results, we must express our obligation to the zealous and intelligent lecturer of Smithfield for pointing out what we have to pay for indulging in an exaggerated sensitiveness on the subject of our glorious liberty. Mr. Organ observes, "England, 'the home of the brave and the free,' calls upon us to take care how we interfere with the rights of her free subjects, even of this class. Ireland says, subject them to surveillance, lest they violate again, unseen and unknown, the privileges allowed the honest, independent, labour-loving members of society, and thus roam at large the abettors of infamy and vice. Here, I say, is one of the great points at issue between the advocates of the English and Irish systems."

We are not, perhaps, sufficiently enlightened to make a bonfire of Magna Charta, or relinquish all our notions that the home of a pack of thieves must be their castle, that it is better nine rogues should escape

than one innocent man suffer unjustly, &c. It may be very desirable, it may be very expedient, it may indeed be declared absolutely necessary, to control the liberty of every professed thief and pickpocket. We admit all this, and wish we may get it. Then why is it not done? Simply because the public wills that it shall not be; they will submit to any thing rather than touch the liberty of the subject. The greatest rascal unhung must either have a fair chance of keeping out of gaol if he can, or when caught must be well taken care of.

Even in the ticket-of-leave, when full discretionary power of revoca tion is retained, the Secretary of State exercises that discretion wisely and justly, in requiring as much proof of an offence as would convict a man were he before a Court. Whether a convict is released a few months sooner or later is not a matter of much consequence to the public. The termination of his sentence arrives, and he is released in due course of law. It is therefore with the gentry whose occupation is plunder that we have to deal. Thousands of them are known to the police, and could be nabbed any day they are "wanted;" but till an enlightened public presses the question on an unwilling Parliament, London will be, as it is, a thieves' paradise.

Something, however, should be done to palliate the evils referred to. Sir J. Jebb, in his report for 1852, suggests that, in the event of its becoming necessary to dispose of irreclaimable convicts in this country, he "would further venture to repeat the suggestion that, as a means of giving more effectual security to the public, some of the restrictions enforced in the Colonies on the holder of a ticket-of-leave might be advantageously applied, and that the system of demanding sureties for good behaviour might be more extensively acted upon." He further proposed that convicts should be dealt with according to their individual character and their circumstances.

We now come to the results of the working of the discipline in England and Ireland respectively, the real test of every thing.

If we are called upon to be astonished at any thing (a feeling which, by the by, we are too old to indulge in except under the pressure of a great emergency), we should be surprised that there should be any relapse into crime on the part of any one individual in Ireland. Nail a man down to a particular spot, see that he has employment, and put a policeman at each elbow to keep him at it, and his only chance of indulging propensities adverse to honesty and industry is to "cut and run." It has been shown that, with all the advantages on the side of our neighbours, -in means of emigration, organised police, means of flying the country, means of employment, &c.,-no fair comparison can be made. We must therefore ascertain if the results in England are "as well as can be expected."

It is within the memory of the oldest inhabitants that only last April the whole land was thrown into a panic by the announcement, on undoubted authority, that 90 per cent of the released convicts were returned into prison after committing the most frightful ravages on society, and