The evening times., 1898-11-02
I:ducntinE the Convict.

An Alabama paper has become mildly
stirred up over the question Of the con-
Wet camps Il that State and OF TIE
South generally, and devotes half a
column to leading editorial article on
the condition of these wards of the
State Il viii be remembered by those
who are interested in special corre-
spondeuts work that last year a man
was pardoned out of a convict mine
after twenty years Of penal servitude.
during which he had not once seen the
Fight Of the sun. Had he not been par
doEed he would have remained there
the Test Of his life. II might naturally
be supposed that the man was mur-
derer, d professional burglar, or some
other sort of confirmed and desperate
criminal. He was nothing OF the kind.
More than twenty years ago three ne
gro boys, typical street gamins. planned
to set d building on fire; at least the
two older boys did. and they employed
the youngest. a child of eleven, to watch
the entrance Of the alley and Sc that
no policeman caught the gang. All
three were caught and taken 10 jail. In
course Of time they we're sentenced to
the penitentiary. The man pardoned
/ cut Of prison year ago was the young
est He was so small that the judge
hesitated to send him to the coal mines
at once. and he was employed for TWO
years IN work about the Jail. At the
, age Of thirteen he went TO the mines,
where he remained until. a grown man.
he received a pardos for general good
conduct. His two comrades had mean
while died. When he came out into the
open air he could speak nothing but
the gibberish used in the mines, and
| tie sunlight hurt his eyes so that he
was obliged to wear blue spectacles to
! avoid blindness. The streets of the
! town where he was born were strange
/ to him. he could find nothing to do, and
! after two days OF freedom he begged
| to be sent back 10 the mines. In a
State where children are sent To the
penitentiary, to become the associates
| Of the most depraved men of both the
white and the negro race, where boys
Of fifteen or sixteen are brought into
! contact with hardened criminals, and
then, after four or five years or less. re-
leased from prison TO become tramps
and vagabonGs, there are still some
people who remark with the glibness
Of moral rectitude that freedom" has
done the negro no good.
In a country where there are no re-
| form schools for negro boys people
moraliZe upon the natural deprayity"
| of these youngsters after they have
served a term or two in the chain gang
They seem to think 1t is truly mys-
| terious.
The particular paper which is exer-
cised in mind over the convict camps
of Alabama has discovered that there
is more or less hardship, if not cruel
ty," connected with coal mining under
this system, the mines being often
damp and unhealthy for any but the
robust. The entire death-rate, it says
with charming candor, is nearly double
the rate outside the convict camps, be-
ing 27.45 per annum in each one thou
| sand. This, it adds, is an improvement
on the preceding two years, and what
If was before a philanthropic press be-
gan to consider it can only be conjec-
| tured.
Having pointed out the conditions un-
der which the convicts live, the Ala
bama paper then remarks, with mild
concern:
| Efforts have been made to raise the religious
| and educational standing of the convicts, but
| It has not been attended by marked results
Perhaps some reasonably compulsory rules could
be adopted in the matter of education. And
some mild form of compulsion might be intro.
duced looking TO their moral and religious train
ing without any serious infraciion Of any consti-
tuition or code.
One of the pet diversions of religious
folk in the days of the old Fleet prison
in England-the days when poor men
were thrown into Jail for not paying
their debts-was to go and read the
Bible and sing hymns to the poor pris-
oners and tell them that they ought to
behave in such way as to go to heaven
when they died. It would be interesting
TO know what the prisoners in a con-
Wet camp where the death rate Is dou-