The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1860-06-29

IT the object of pun shment is not to reform Of
Tenders, but to prevent them from giving any fur
Their trouble to society, the French have adopted
the only true plan to attain this desirable result
The cheapest and most expeditions method
of getting rid of criminals is, unuuestion-
ably, to transport them to CAYENNE, as
the French Government is now doing. A
learned Professor of the University of Berlin has
lately published a voluminous and interesting
work, in which he treats of the various 'systems
'of deportation from the time of the Romans to-
the present day. In this treatise the settlements
at Cayenne are described at considerable length,
and it the statements made about them are not exag
gerated, a new field has been discovered in which
our philanthropc brethren of New England ought
to set to work Immediately. Instead of encour-
aging each other to go 10 the rescue of suffering
humanity in the cornfeds of Virginia, they should
at once send a respectable fotilla and redeem out
of captivity the prisoners who are lauguishing
amid the sultry marshes of Guiana. In 1871 some
five hundred unfortunates were sent by the Drec-
tory to Cayenne, but it is only since 1851 that it
has been recognized ''the transportation colony
''of France A correct idea of the nature of the
climate may be formed from the fact that out of
IA 900 people, who induced by the Govern
ment to emigrate there i'll the last century, only
1000 were alive two years after they landed
Several attempts have been made TO establish
and maintain French settlement, which might
hope in time to become prosperous, but without
success. In 1886 there were but l., 100 whites in
population of $4,000, and in the fifteen years
following that date, the population had diminished
-hn1f In t1na f1,a IL
among the convcts is forty per cent? and in an
other is said that out of 10 prisoners 100 died
within twelvemonih. Such is the pestilental
province to which France banshes her unruly
citizens. AT first, only political offenders were
sent there, but now ordinary convicts are also
transported to its shores. The sites selected for
the different penal settlements are usually small
islands, situated in the midst of marshes, and it
is merely because it is easy matter to guard
them that they are chosen the places of residence
for the luckleSs exes The latter are not compel
led to labor, for the spots to which they are con-
fined are too small and too worthless to pay for
tie expense of their cultivation. If these state
ments are strictly true, and they come from an
apparently responsible source the nation, which
prdes itself leading the civilization of the age
is rather behind other countries at least in the
matter of prison discipline. Though it goes to
war with its neighbor for an idea, there is much
to be done at home in the way of reform and pro-
gress, which has heen already too long neglected.
But it may be that we have mistaken the purposes
OF the French government. 1t is not apt to be
sentimental about matters of state policy, and it
Is barely possible that the miserable end which
overtakes seven out of ten among the convicts in
Cayenne is the identical one which they were sent
there to meet. In that case it has acted well and
wisely In designating the miasmatic locality in
question as the place of abode for criminals