The Press.
London, England, 1858-09-25 00:00:00

however far removed they may be, to all appear-
ances, from the pale of humanity. So strongly,
indeed, has this been felt, that the penal bondage
of the felon, with all its inevitable concomitants
of degradation and misery, is yet a sore invidenda
when contrasted with the sufferings and priva-
tions undergone by such of our pauper popula-
tion as groan under the present execrable tyranny
of the workhouse system—a tyranny the more
grinding, because tolerably irresponsible and
lacking a powerful exponent of its system. That
some comment on the present state of things is
not uncalled for may be inferred from the fact
that, while the mass of the lower orders are

known to entertain the most deeply-rooted aver-
sion to " durance vile" in the Union, very many
amongst them view a detention in our correc-
tive and didactic" prisons with philosophic indif-
ference, not to say complacency ; and hence we
often hear inferences drawn by no means compli-
mentary to the English character.
The premium now-a-days placed upon crime is,
no doubt, too strong to be resisted by minds tutored
only in the harsh schools of Poverty and Adversity,
accompanied too by a perception too blunted to
allow of discrimination between the nice distinc-

tions of vice, positive and negative. In fact, the
problem to be solved by the poor too often
resolves itself into the following shape :—Given,
Hunger without the means of satisfying it ;
required, a choice between the Gaol and the
Union—the Gaol, with its multiplied comforts,
and the Union, with its maximum of labour and
minimum of the bare necessaries of life. Nor is
this description a mere rhetorical trope, since the
lot of a " Union-pauper " has by no means fallen
in pleasant places. Crowded quarters; miserable
accommodation; food which would be indignantly
rejected even by a Russian serf;—these, and
worse than these, are the vita incommoda which
are indeed stern realities frequently encountered
without a murmur by the aged, needy, and dis-
tressed. What wonder, then, if the working
man's keen sense of justice and love of fair treat-
ment induce him to prefer an abode in prison,
which he knows can be obtained with little loss
of self-respect, and with scarcely any concomitant
degradation in the eyes of his mates ? Many a
poor man has responded to the interrogation,
" How could he disgrace himself by committing
" an offence against the laws ?" by a counter-
thrust to the effect that detention in a prison
branded him with far less infamy than the
reductio ad pauperum system of the Union.

It would be quite beside the mark and foreign
to our purpose to inquire whether we have not
erred somewhat on the side of humanity in deal-
ing with our criminal population ? whether
those rare exotics now being forced in the refor-
matories of the country will not ultimately prove
a decided failure, and the raw-head-and-bloody-
bones party again emerge triumphantly ? But
what we do wish especially to impress upon the
minds of our readers is that the claims of misfor-
tune upon our sympathy are unquestionably
stronger than, and prior to, those of crime.
Now, from the days of the philanthropic HOWARD
to our own much-vaunted nineteenth century of
enlightenment and progress, the condition of the
felon has been one of marked and rapid amelio-
ration. Nothing, indeed. has been more notable
than the entire subversion of the pre-existing
mode of treating our criminal fellow-subjects.
In this respect, if in no other, we are prone to
pique ourselves upon our far-sighted philan-
thropy. Our houses of correction and reforma-
tory prisons are more essentially national insti-
tutions than are our press, our railroads, and our
telegraphs. The anomalies and abuses of our
prisons have been portrayed by more than one
master-pen, and iniquities, hitherto deemed in-
separable from any organized system of punish-
ment, have been scanned in all their revolting
details by the microscopic glance of the
philosophic mind. Reform has accordingly ad-
vanced a pas du Oant in this direction ; and the
movement originated by individual efforts has
now become national in its scope and amplitude,
and, with so laudable a victory in the foreground,
it certainly does seem very surprising that the
poor man should never yet have found a
champion of sufficient mettle to do battle with
the grim Demogorgon ECONOMY, falsely so
called, especially as the public pursestrings are
readily relaxed whenever a loud though indis-
criminating cry is raised.