New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1871-05-10
THE LAST SABBATH
A VISIT TO THE DOOMED


1t was no feeling of mere curiosity that
Sunday last.
Within its walls two men now abide who,
though yet in time, are in all human proba-
bility so near the dread future that they
seem, to rejecting minds, to partake al
ready of the solemn, unexplored eternity.
We view them with the same underlined
feeling of awe with which we view men
who have been in far-Off strange countries,
the very antipodes of all that we have been
accustomed TO. There they are, with
pulses that beat with no tremor, but still
keep touch and time. Yet it is a recorded
certainty that ere another Sabbath dawns
those pulses will have ceased to beat, will
keep touch and time no longer, and the
"viewless essence" will have taken its de-
parture to learn the realities of another
world, leaving the earthly clod ''to lie in
cold obstruction and to rot"
To the mass of the American people,
among whom the first day of the week has
been set apart as day of rest, and sancti-
fed to'religious observance, there would
be something supremely solemn in the idea
that man was spending, consciously so,
his last Sabbath on earth; that to him
death had none of the uncertainty of hour
and minute that walls its approaches from
the mass of manhind. How awful TO know
that his days and hours are numbered with
a precision far beyond the meaning with
which Holy Writ tells us that our sands Of
life are numbered. 1t would be thought,
too, that one who so approached the dark
hour of death would use the little space of
time left in mremitting preparation-in
prayer, in partaking of the offices of re-
ligion-that peradventure, grace and for
giveness might yet be found. 1t would be
thought that his last Sabbath on earth
would be especially dedicated to religious
services, deeply imbued with the idea that
it was to him the last.
We entered the prison at rather an early
hour on Sunday morning, anxious to inspect
prison life in it's Sabbath aspect, previous to
witnessing the religious services which, We
supposed, would occupy the day in the cells
of the men condemned to die. The superin
tendent of the prison, Captain R. N. John
son, with ready courtesy, responded to our
wish by introducing Mr., Thomas Carey, dep
uty keeper, and directing that gentleman to
show lis every object of interest.
We may here remark that one striking
of the Parish Prison, through
out, is its extreme cleanliness. We are in
the habit of connecting prisons with the
idea of squalor. But this idea could be no
where more out of place than in the Parish
Prison. every hole and corner, from top to
bottom, is daily purified with hypercriticaI
ablutions, such as seldom obtain in even
the best ordered households. Hence, in a
prison which, generally, contains several
of that class who, if cleanliness is
next to godliness, are great many removes
from being cleanly, there is nothing through
out the prison offensive to smell, nor to
sight, except the facial expression of vice to
be found among the law-breaking inmates.
1t must not be understood that the ex-
treme cleanliness of the prison is
matter of peculiar preparation, for an
the rule of every'day, and no mat
er at what time visit may be made, the
place will always be found very model of
cleanliness. And this is oaly equaled by
he admirable discipline maintained by
captain johnson and his subordinate Off |
ers, Mr.. J. D. Houston, head deputy; De- |
,uty Thomas Carey, and Messrs. Pichou,
Jary and BOfll, uRder-keepers. We were
old that there is seldom occasion to in
lict punishment. there being but few in
ractions of the rules. The discipline ap-
sears to be. kept up among many of the
prisoners by the Ineligible consideration
hat there is no legal delay or bubble to
AXE advantage of, but that punishment for
ffense is both certain and summary. We
otioed, too, that in the necessary inter
rs, the former showed nothing of the ira
itional surliness of the Warder in sensa-
ion novel Neither was there any exhibi-
ion of stolid sulkiness on the part of the
alter; the intercourse appears to be more
Ike that of foreman and hand. We notice
his from no desire to give c0ulenr de rose
0 prison life, bat to instance the admirable
so creditable to Sheriff
Iasicot, Captain johnson and the sub
rdinate officers.
Walking through the wards, noticing the
ccupation and demeanor of the prisoners,
here was little in the countenances of most
t them to tell of defiance of law, or of war
gainst society. Most of them would be 7
AIKEN by an uniformed observer as respec-
len land women) among them; men whose
able mechanics. And there are, too, bad