The criminal could not endure solitary confinement. He must have work . In all the penitentiaries of the country, at the present time, convicts are required to perform some kind of useful labor. That is one point of the prison question that is, doubtless, forever settled. Labor to the prisoners means health of body and mind.
Solitary confinement means the reverse.
All the prisoners of the Missouri penitentiary are let out to contractors, with the exception of those needed to do the work about the prison. The work consists chiefly of making saddle-trees and shoes. Several large three-story buildings are used in furnishing room for the convicts while at labor. Those contractors who have been at the prison for some time have grown rich. They get their men for forty-five cents a day, on an average.