The daily Cairo bulletin. (Cairo, Ill.) 1878-1???, 1882-08-19

before them. Above all they should be
provided with employment something
to which their energies should be irected
and their honest labor should be rewarded
by fair price, that want should never drive
them ton disregard of their neighbors rights.
Legitimate and innocent amusements are
also very important factors, aud should be
provided and by this means a prolific source
OF crime would be dried up and young
men aud women would be saved from one
OF the most dangerous of all the incentives
TO crime,
II in spite of all these provisions persons
will commit crime, they should not be
abandoned bvt charity should follow them
even into the cell and attempt there what
was not accom- plished outside, Jails and
penetentiaries organized as they now are,
are rather schools of stu than means of re-
form. The instruments and lnstru
mentalities of the law need more re-
form then our selhshness would he willing
to admit. TO lock prisoner up and set
in motion the machinery for his conviction
and long incarceration is not or should not
be the sole end and aim Of the citizen. To
make him better man is the first duty we
owe him aud ourselves, and selfprotecton
as we'll as christian charity suggests this as
the better course.
Whilst on this subject we collats from
an exchange some remarks apropos to the
subject as showing at least one method by
which the result we hope for might he at
tanned
Speaking Of French female prisoners it
says; they are treated with more kindness,
on the whole, than persons of their class
are elsewhere. They are allowed the same
privileges as the men in the matter of earn
ing money and buying things at the can
teen. Those of them who are young also
enjoy privilege not granted to female
convicts in other couutries-that of having
husbands provided for them by the state.
But these husbands must be convicts. Ev-
cry six months notice is circulated IN the
female penitentiarles, calling upon all wo-
men who feel minded to 90 out to New
Caledonia and be married to make an APP.
plicaton to that effect through the Governor
The matrim lnisl candidates must b 9
young, and exempt from physical intirml-
ties. Girls under long sentences readily
catch at this method of escaping from the
intolerable tedum Of prison life and the
pretty ones are certain to be put on the
Governors list no matter how frightful
may be the crimes for which they have
been sentenced.
The selected candidates have to sign en-
gagements promising to marry conyicts
and to settle in New Caledonia for the re-
msinder Of their lives On these conditions,
government transports them, gives them
q decent outfit Their marriages are ar
ranged for them by the governor of the
colony, who has a selection of well behaved
convicts ready for th em to choose from
and each girl may consult her own fancy
within certain limits, for the proportion Of
marriagable men to whom is about three
TO one, OF course, ifa girl declares that
none OF the aspirsnt bridegrooms submit.
ted 70 her inspection has met with her ap.
prevail the governor can only shrug his
shoulders in the usual French way, 1t has
happened more than once that pretty girls
have been wooed by warders free settlers,
Of time expired soldiers and sailors, instead
Of by convicts In such cases the governor
can only assent to marriage on condi-
ton that the female conyct's free lover
shall place himself in the position of a
ticket.of- leave man, and undertake
never to leave the colony. Love works
wonders, aud there is no instance on record
Of man having refused to comply with
these conditions when once he had fallen
IN love, There are some instances though
OF the authorities having declined TO let
a female convict marry free man, when
they were not convinced that the latter
was person Of firm character and kindly
disposition. For the woman's own sakes
1t is necessary that they should not be
married to men who would be likely, in
some moment Of temper, to fling their
dsreputable antecedents into their teeth
THERE'S nothing Of this kind to fear when
female convict gets welded to man
whose past life mas been as bad as her
own.
Why tue French government should have
sadded Use il with the responsibility of
promoting marriages among conwc.s it is
difficult to say but the experiment has on
the whole yielded very good results. The
| married COynlpa upt huIa and franz orantu