the future production; who in truth is more anxious for the public service than his own fame, and who, in public attention, rests upon facts and not upon phrases."

It has been stated that O'Connell was extremely abusive at times both in public and in the Courts. Occasionally, he was paid back in his own coin. One of the most effective pieces of invective in existence is the passage in which Lord Lyndhurst-himself an advocate of supreme ability-attacked O'Connell in the House of Lords. With that passage this sketch of O'Connell may suitably be concluded. O'Connell had been present at a debate in the Upper House, and his demeanour had enraged Lord Lyndhurst. The noble lord made a fierce attack upon him, and applied to him the words which Cicero applied to Catiline and his conduct in the Senate House

"This person has so scathed himself, has so exhibited himself in a variety of postures-not always the most seemly and decentamid the shouts and applause of a multitude, that all description upon my part is wholly unnecessary. But these exhibitions have not been bootless to him. He has received lavish contributions from the connexions of the present Government, while at the same time he has wrung, by the aid of the priests, the miserable pittance from the hands of the starving and famishing peasant. This person has in every shape and form insulted your Lordships, your Lordships' House, and many of you individually. He has denounced you, doomed you to destruction, and, availing himself of your courtesy, he comes to your Lordships' Bar, he listens to your proceedings, he marks and measures you as his victims. Etiam in senatum venit; notat designatque oculis ad caedem unumquemque nostrúm."

J. A. LOVAT-FRASER.

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VI. THE REPORT OF THE COMMISSIONERS

OF PRISONS.1

HE Report of the Commissioners of Prisons for the

THE

year ending 31st March, 1912, has appeared in good time and will prove very gratifying to the public. The report of the previous year was an unusually good one, but this report is in almost all respects better; and though the causes which tend to increase or diminish the amount of crime in any country are too numerous and sometimes too difficult to trace to enable us to speak with confidence of the success or failure of any system without a long trial, the recent succession of results, showing a steady and marked improvement, go far to prove that the more humane prison system which has been adopted of late years has tended not to increase but to diminish the general mass of crime. The Commissioners note, too, that the unrest which prevailed among the workers during the last year might have been expected to lead to the contrary result, and there is in fact an increase in the number of assaults and cases of drunkenness, but it is not large enough to prevent a considerable improvement in the general aggregate of crimes, nor were either of these offences so prevalent last year as they were a few years ago. The following remarks made by the Commissioners in their present report indicate their position :

"Our constant effort is to hold the balance between what is necessary as punishment, and for the due execution of the sentence from a penal and deterrent point of view, and what can be conceded consistently with this in the way of humanising and reforming influences. It is, we hope, quite unnecessary to refute the idle statements which obtain currency among those unacquainted with the system that prisons are made comfortable. They are only comfortable Report of the Commissioners of Prisons for the year 1911-12. London : Wyman & Sons.

1

1912.

in so far as the laws of hygiene compel cleanliness and wholesome food and decent clothing-all which things are often absent in the lives of the persons who come to prison. The penalty of crime is not in fantastic devices for causing pain or discomfort or cruelty. This was the old idea, which has long since passed away. The penalty is in the dishonouring circumstances which must attend the loss of liberty; in the deprivation of what liberty permits in the way of indulgence and self-gratification, in compulsory labour, in the loss of self-respect. Nothing can add to the flétrissure which these things involve." And they go on to refer to concerts, lectures and similar matters, to which we refer the readers. In fact the Commissioners seem to accept in substance, though not in language, the humanitarian position that punishment is not an end but a means, that the end is the protection of the public against the ill-consequences of crime, and that no more pain, discomfort, or inconvenience ought to be inflicted on any person than is necessary for the protection of the public.

Having referred to the number of causes by which our prison population is affected, I may note that the decrease in the number of imprisoned debtors goes on steadily, though here, I think, the cause must be sought elsewhere than in our prison system. In 1910-11 the total number of persons imprisoned "as debtors or on civil process" was 17,437, while in 1911-12 it fell to 15,543, of which latter number only 6,847 were committed by the County Courts. Both these figures are the lowest that have been reached for many years. The judges of the County Courts seem to be awaking to the fact that the Debtors Act intended to require satisfactory evidence (in the legal sense of the term) of means to pay before making a committal order. I was somewhat surprised, however, that a report which contains so much about the special treatment of certain classes of prisoners (including the suffragettes) contains no reference

to any such special provisions in the case of imprisoned debtors who were treated in a much more lenient manner previous to the year 1898 than has been done subsequently. The severer rules adopted in that year seem to have been based on the assumption that the imprisoned debtor usually had the money, and that extra pressure would induce him to part with it. The result was to establish the contrary; but we do not learn that there has been any relaxation of the rules relating to debtors.

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A class of offenders, however, closely akin to these imprisoned debtors, has attracted the attention of the Commissioners-persons committed for not being able to pay the alternative fine. More than one-half of the total number of persons committed to prison are, it appears, committed for this reason, and committed in the great majority of cases for terms so short that they can derive little or no benefit from the prison system. A Bill, we are told, has been prepared for the purpose of amending the law in this respect, but unfortunately Parliamentary time has not admitted of its discussion." It is probably not the only measure of useful reform which is "unavoidably postponed." The Commissioners intimate that if more time were given to pay the fine it would often be forthcoming, and though at first sight it might be supposed that their object was to obtain longer sentences for trivial offences, they seem quite alive to the importance of not sending people to prison at all unless it is necessary in the interest of the public to do I might perhaps suggest that there should be no imprisonment for non-payment of fines until the accumulated fines came to £1 (or some other fixed sum), and that a similar rule might be made as regards non-payment of instalments or other periodical payments. As regards short sentences, however, until recently first offenders usually deteriorated in prison, and the shortest sentences involved least risk of contamination. That there has been a great

so.

improvement in this respect seems undoubted, but can we even still say that the advantages of prison life so preponderate over its disadvantages that a long detention is more desirable than a shorter one? It costs more, and this is a matter which ought not to be lost sight of.

There is a good deal about prison labour in this Report, and the authorities seem on the whole to be doing their best to make it remunerative. But the prisoners' labour is never sufficient to provide for their maintenance in prison, and the figures in the report show the utter futility (under any system resembling the present one even remotely) of requiring prisoners to make restitution by means of their labour in prison. At the end of a year's work it would be found that the thief had not earned nearly enough to pay for his board, lodging and attendance. As a rule, it may be said that wherever the stolen property has been disposed of, the prosecution and conviction of the thief renders restitution impossible, and, even if it were possible, I do not see why this debt should have precedence over all other claims of whatever description.

If there are some branches in which I regard the results as unsatisfactory, the fault does not lie with the Prisons Commissioners who have worked earnestly and intelligently, and well deserve the large measure of success which has attended their efforts. Seventeen executions seems to be over the average and so is thirty-three death-sentences. Five of the latter were passed on women and commuted-probably being cases of infanticide-which leaves 24 convictions of males' with 17 executions—a high per-centage for a year not marked by specially brutal murders. Nearly twenty years. ago we had under Sir M. W. Ridley 14 death-sentences with 8 commutations. Are we retrograding? The Commissioners might have given us fuller information on this subject.

1 There were 28 males convicted of murder of whom 17 were executed and 7 sentences commuted. What became of the remaining 4? Probably they were found to be insane.