The Sun.
London, England, 1869-03-08 00:00:00

PRISONERS' FRIENDS.

Uncter this heading, the Daily News presents its readers
with an interesting article. "On certain mornings, and at
regular hours, small groups of woe-begone tearful girls
and women may," it says "be seen in the Old Bailey,
exchanging whispers with each other, or threading their
way silently through the throng of meat salesmen, City
policemen, ticket porters, warehousemen, clerks, and
shopboys, with which the busy place is full. They are
the female friends of prisoners in Newgate, are of all ages,
and beyond misery and shabbiness, have little in common.
The girls look prematurely old and worn, and many
of them have the unmistakeable expression all hunted
animals obtain ; while the older women may be
divided into two classes—the callous and the crushed.
The object of their journey is to see and converse with
their husbands or lovers, their brothers or sons confined in
Newgate. These last are taking their prescribed amount
of exercise in the prison yards, and it is from behind one
of the gratings looking on these that they are permitted to
gaze from a prescribed distance upon, and exchange words
with, their visitors. Between the prisoners and their
friends runs a passage of about a yard wide, with another
set of iron bars fencing it off horn the place where the
women stand, so that between the visitors and the visited
are two stout barriers and sufficient space to preclude
the possibility of articles being handed from one to the
other. There are no seats. The prisoners are told to
break out of the line of march, and permitted to advance
to the grating of the yard in batches of three or four.
The women who have come to see them stand exactly
opposite, within the prison, and all have to press their
faces close to the bars to make hearing possible. If a
double set of wild-beast cages were planted in parallel
lines, with the ironwork of each facing the others, but a
yard or so apart ; if the lions and tigers were pushing their
noses eagerly at the barriers, as if trying to escape ; and if
a keeper or two were planted in the intervening space to
watch, a fair imitation of Newgate Gaol during visiting
hours would be obtained." Describing a particularscene the
writer in the Daily News says :" A stout florid-faced man,
who looks like a country farmer, and who is gesticulating
violently through the bars to the cowed and crying little
woman beyond them, is in on a charge of horse-stealing.
He has been in prison before, and indeed was only out of
it ten days when he was again apprehended. A muscular,
powerful man, he looks as if he could carry off a horse
bodily, if necessary; and one wonders what the messages
are he is impressing so earnestly on his wife. A warder is
standing near enough to the twain to overhear their talk,
but we are assured no effort is made to eavesdrop ;
the presence of a prison official being insisted on
simply as a precautionary measure. Next to the horse-
dealer is a well-dressed young clerk, whose alleged
offence is embezzlement. The elderly woman whose sobs
reach us across the yard is his mother. She seems to be
pleading earnestly, and he to be half sullen, half ashamed,
but finally to yield to her entreaties whatever their pur-
port may have been. The third prisoner being visited is
an older man, and the girl talking to him looks like his
daughter. Their interview is far calmer than the other
two, and seems indeed of a business character; for some
clean linen has been brought, and the man is actually
talking of the weather as we pass by—a proceeding which
we thought a feint, but which, as we were reminded, was
natural enough. The three-quarters of an hour allotted
to each interview is doubtless a very precious time,
It can only be had on particular days, and the
strongest wish of those concerned must be to compress
as many questions and answers into it as possible.
But this very eagerness defeats itself ; just as it often
happens, that when people meet after a long absence, and
for a limited time, they fail to recall half the topics in
which they are vitally interested. In the other yards
we visited, men and women were absolutely staring at
each other through the bars, in silence ; though the latter
had come on purpose to talk, and the former would be shut
up again in a quarter of an hour. In some cases it may
have been the dumbness of despair which made them
tongue-tied ; but many seemed so nervously anxious to
express all they had to say that they were unable to arrange
their ideas sufficiently to give them articulate shape."
In conclusion, our contemporary remarks that the prison
of Newgate is "so obviously well managed, and the coin.
forts—we had almost written the luxuries—of its inmates
are so carefully secured, that its authorities have doubtless
sufficient reasons for the rules under which the visits
of prisoners' friends may be paid and received.
Still, a vast majority of the inmates are `remand cases,'
and as they are all sent elsewhere as soon as possible
after conviction, it is difficult to repress a wish that some
less restricted mode of communication could be allowed.
Although many of the evil faces we saw marching round
were old prison hands, we presume that the law holds
them innocent of the particular offences they are charged
with, until it finds them guilty. Again, it must occasion-
ally happen that guiltless persons who have been com-
mitted for trial are detained here, and there is something
repulsive in the absolutely penal character of the reception
they have in each case to give their friends."

It is stated that Mr. Rearden, of Athlone, intends
to become a candidate for the representation of Sligo. He
has written for a copy of the borough register.

The Midland Great Western Company of Ireland
have offered a reward of £2OO for information that may load
to the discovery of the person who fired at their station-
master at Mullingar. Anketell unfortunately died on
Saturday. _

At the Cheltenham County Court, on Friday, the
judge granted a motion foc a new trial of the case in which
the name of Mr. Sims Reeves was recently prominently
brought forward.

In the Bradford County Court on Friday a tripe
dealer sued Messrs. Storey and Garnett, the petitioners
against the return of Mr. Forster, for two guineas, which
he alleged was due to him for four days'atteniance at the
court and giving evidence upon the election inquiry. The
defence set up was the technical one, that as the plaintiff had
not produced a certificate from the judge he was not en-
titled to recover expenses. There are other cases of a
similar character to be heard, and the Court deferred judg-
ment.

Referring to the representation of Scarborough the
Eastern 2lforning News states that public feeling appears to
bo greatly in favour of Sir Harcourt Johnstone, Bart., as a
candidate for the seat lately held by his father. Should he
accede to the request to offer himself he will probably be
spared the pain of taking any very active part in the election.
The Conservatives are not taking any open action, and in
the face of the very strong Liberal feeling prevailing there
is no present probability of opposition. According to the
Leeds Mercury an application has Leen made to Mr. Roebuck,
late M.P. for Sheffield, to allow himself to be put in nomina-
tion, but as yet no answer has been received from the
honourable gentleman.

The Church Bill is discussed in the Irish "National'
journals. The Irishman says it is "the Fenian plough
which has upset the Establishment." It regards the offer
made to tenants of Church lands to purchase their farms
and become peasant proprietors, paying a fourth of the pur-
chase-money, as a "highly satisfactory feature in the
scheme." It objects to the "nobler ecclesiastical and his-
toric ruins, such as Cashel, merging with the burial ground
to the custody of the poor-law guardians." It " protests
against the alienation of the cathedrals." The Nation says
that, "compared with the Disestablishing Act of 1869, the
Emancipation Act of 1829 was a miserable compromise."
The application of the Church funds it regards as a minor
question, but considers that, on the whole, "Mr. Gladstone's
is not an un-national or a bad one."

A -WARM BEETII.—The West Florida Commercial
says that the two Peruvian ironclads now lying off War-
rington Navy-yard performed in their voyage from the
Mississippi to that point quite satisfactorily. The greatest
trouble experienced was from the intense heat. The
thermometer indicated, as a minimum, 120 degrees.
A number of robust firemen had to succumb
before the vessel arrived at Pensacola. If in a
stretch of a little over 100 miles a number of firemen
were " burnt out," it is difficult to see how the officers
of the fleet can hope to take the ironclads to Peru.
NEW AND GIGANTIC PLANT.—Within the last
few days living specimens have been forwarded to this
country from Nicaragua of one of the most gigantic
plants in the vegetable kingdom. It is closely allied to
the Arums (or "Lords and Ladies") of our hedges, and
until the present time has wholly escaped the notice of
travelling botanists. It produces but one leaf, nearly
14ft. in length, supported on a stalk 10ft. long. The stem
of the flower is a f, Jot in circumference, the spathe or
flower 2ft. long, purplish blue in colour, with a powerful
carrion•like odour. As this remarkable species of Aroidere
is quite new to science it has not yet received a name.
—Builder.

THE TRAGEDY AT BLACKWALL.-011 Saturday
evening Mr. Humphreys held an inquest at the Crown
Tavern, High.street, Shadwell, respecting the death of
John Cooper, aged 26 years. Edward Cooper, brother of
the deceased, stated that he lived at 4, Grundy-street,
Poplar. He said that ha had seen the body, which
lay in the deadhouse of St. George's Church,
Shadwell, and he identified it as that of John
Cooper, who was an engineer by trade. Edward
Rolinson, Burns-street, Commercial-road, said that
he apprehended the body of the deceased as he saw it
floating down the river, nearly opposite the dock entrance,
on Friday morning, at twenty minutes past six o'clock
Coroner : I do not think that you will get the reward.
Dr. Ross said that the cause of the deceased's death was
drowning. A policeman produced a rent book, which he
had found on the deceased's body. There was -Cooper's
name in it. The jury returned a verdict of "Found
dro;;•ned in the river Thames, but how the eaickd9th wal