The Vermont transcript. [volume] (St. Albans, Vt.) 1864-1870, 1865-10-27
Elizabeth Fry.
Nvi,c, Mother, Rcformcr.
nv +. D. nuNrlNGroN, b. D.

Instead of rapt medltations, or the
ineffable emotions awakened in retire
ment by secluded communion with
God, apart from the world, we have a
list of everyday foibles, in common
contact with the familiar world, as the
following: II have given way to my
passions: | have known my faults and
not corrected them. Now | am deter
mined will once more try with re-
doubled ardor. | must not be ont Of
temper with the childr'n: | must not
lirt; | must not contradict without
cause; must not be sullen when my
sisters are liked and l am not must
not be angry, | must not exaggerate;
must not give way to luxury, nor be
idle; | must give way to every good
feeling, and overcome every bad If |
had hut perseverance | could do all
that | wish l viii try Again, a year
later, she draws up list of regula-
tons to govern her private conduct.
They are these: 81 Never lose any
time, but be always employed. 2. New
er err the least in truth. 3 Never say
an i'll thing of person when | can
say good thing. 4. Never be irrita-
BILE or unknd to anybody. 5. Never
indulge myself in Injuries not neces-
sary. 6. Do al things with consider
alton, feel confidence in that power
that alone is able to assist me, and ex-
ert my own powers as far as they will
go" These things certainly betoken
a Christianity at the widest possible
remove from all abstruseness or mys-
ticism.
About the year 1917, and when sew
en- young children were receiving her
incessant watchfulncss Mt home, she
commenced the series of unexampled
labors i'll behalf of prison reform, and
the moral instruction of convicts,
which, above all her other enterprises,
have signalized her life, and made her
name to be sweet spell in all the
dungeons and jailyards of Christen-
dom. Up to this time the indifference
to the condition Of prisoners, and the
consequent depravity Of all places Of
penal confinement, even IN the most
civilized countries, had been incredible
The subject had Jagged fightfully be
hind nearly every other humane move
ment, except perhaps the ameliora-
ton Of the criminal code itself
Accurate and authentic accounts,
many of them drawn up under the di-
rection of the government, of the
state prisons in England at SO recent
a date and the matter was scal cely
better in America on on the continent
reveal spectacle monstrous and
disgusting almost beyond belief Dirt
that would disgrace gentleman's sta
bic, disease in its most revolving
forms, because the direct fruit of filth,
nakedness, gambling, drinking and
swearing, made up the common scene
ny of both the male and female depart
ments of large proportion of the
prisons of the realm. Take the famous
London Newgate as specimen.
There, on the womens side, which
was very imperfectly screened from a
shameful publicity, within narrow
space, some three hundred women,
with their herds of unfortunate child
rem, were crowded together IN fetid
atmosphere, to inhale moral putre-
faction, worse only than the bodily
pestilence bred in snch a stye of cor
ruption. Insufliciently clothed, with
out any other bedding than their I'M
wholesome rags, sleeping on the floor
with planks for pillows, inhabiting,
cooking and washing in the same
apartment, Gods children were hud-
died together in conditions such ms it
would be crime to innict on brutes.
All these women were under the SUI
perintendence Of two or three men,
not always above them in moral feel
ing. Many of them placed there un-
der charges of trivial nature--for
small offenses and often first oflonse--
the less guilty soon caught the infec- /
ton of the hardened and desperate /
criminals. The tried and the untried
perhaps the ABSOLUTELY innoeent-be- /
ginners in transgression and adopts in /
infamy, without classification, and, I
worse yet, without employment, they
were left in these hideous and fatal
fellowships. Intoxicating drinks, by
one means and another, often found
their way into the inclosure.to help on
the work of ruin, OF to Supply the des-
pairing Language that would be ter
rife even TO INSCRIPTIONS ears was
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