San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1892-02-26
What Female Prisoners viii Often I'm
dergo to Adorn Themselves.

What Female Prisoners Will Often Un-
dergo to Adorn Themselves.
An ex-keeper of penitentiary being
asked the other day to describe some of
the characteristics of the female prisoners
in the wards, said that one of the things
that struck her most forcibly was the way
in which the personal vanity of women
prisoners remained strong within most of
them to the last no matter what other
traits prison life crushed out. When bustles
were fashionable many prisoners would
sacrifice the warmth of their petticoats,
even in midwinter, in order to roll them
up under their skirts to give them fash
ionable hump behind. No man but the
chaplain and the warden saw them, and
then only occasionally; and what satisfac-
tion it gave them that would offset their
shivering it is hard to see.
The wearing of prison uniform is great
blow to them. Few of them when they
enter seem to expect that 1t never oc-
CURED to them that they would have to
take off all their ornaments and wear the
ugly convict garb, and they plead for a
ribbon or ring more pitifully than they
would for food. But when it comes to
cropping their hair close, that is the finish
ing touch; you'd think their hearts would
break. They may have remained stolid
and stoical all through their trial, received
their sentence even in silence; but when it
comes to cropping off their treasured locks
their pleadings and prayers and tears and
cries would move heart of stone.
II remember the case Of one woman in
particular" said the speaker, "who man
aged to excite and sustain the envy OF
nearly all her companions in misfortune
by keeping her short black hair shining
with oil How she did it, where she got
the oil, was a mystery that set myself to
find out. 1t took me a long time to do it.
but finally was rewarded. She used to
let her soup get perfectly cold. Then she
would carefully skim off the grease that
had risen to the top, and use it on her hair.
Then she drank her soup. Try to drink
cold soup yourself, and you will be able to
appreciate the sacrifice she made for van
ity's sake.
Another woman managed to rouge her
cheeks, on which the prison life was set
thing its inevitable pallor. This caused
even more stir than the oiled hair did; and
when coaxing failed to draw the secret
from her the other prisoners made charges
Of favoritism against me- intimating that
let the rosy checked woman have privileges
denied to others. / watched this prisoner
also for some time before found that she
could make her gums bleed easily, by
scratching them with her nails, and this
blood she applied to her cheeks with graft
flying success.
ITO do this she had to have a looking
glass, something prohibited by the rules.
And yet she had one-a piece of ordinary
glass, with a black rag behind it for quick
silver. When found it on her bed re-
membered that weeks before she had sub
jected herself to extra punishment by
breaking pane Of glass. With piece of
the broken pane she had constructed this
primitive mirror, in which she got dis
torted view of her features that no doubt
gave her great comfort, though why it
should not rather depress her spirits to
look at herself in such clothes and with
cropped hair never could understand, ~
New York Tribune.