Evening star., 1901-11-30

each has table, an electric light, wider
bed than In the other grades, with husk
mattress on 1t. the others being filled with
straw The pictures on the walls are still
larger and better, there Is larger library
to draw upon and the recreation room, with
its papers and magazines, Its Gagged birds,
its plants and flowers. is CHEEKY. Here the
abler ones speak pieces and read from good
books, and there are asking of questions
and discussion. This room Is open every
noon and on Monday night. The study of
authors has recently been taken up and
you shall hear discoursing on Whittier and
Longfellow, and even on Browning.
Also. there is a music class on Wednesday
nights and progress has been made in this
direction, a good choir having been picked
for the chapel exercises Music is to be
heard in the chapel every evening, as wen
as In the Sunday services, which comprise
Catholic mass, Protestant service and Sun
day school The low grade students eat
from tin plates and cups, but the fourth
grade women have a spacious dining room,
with table cloths, china, salt shakers and
palms on the table. The upper grades sup
port temperance society in which there
are condolences, since it is not possible to
secure anything stronger, except in case of
Illness OF hospital cases there are more
in proportion than in the mems prisons,
yet the general health seems to be excel
lent.
The Probation Agent.
Massachusetts does not wait till it has
formatory process in the police court. There
are in the state seventy probation officers,
Of whom two, in Boston, are women, whose
duty it is to attend trials in the lower
courts and where possible secure mercy for
such as deserve 1t, as many do. 1t is ODD
to note the discrepancy between police re-
ports and the findings of these agents and
reformatory officers. The police, of course,
see the worst of people. A lad is caught
stealing. Ergo, he is to be arrested and
punished 1t does not enter into the calcu-
lation of the policeman that the lad Is not
habitually a thief, and that he has been
discovered in possibly the only serious OF
fense of which he was ever guilty in his
life. Those facts the probation officer does
find, however, by inquiry in the home anc
workshop of the prisoner, and 1t Is seldom
that judge refuses to listen to the plead
ings of the agent. Forty thousand mel
and women who would otherwise have gone
| to Jail or prison for slight offenses, to theil
| disgrace and the distress of their families
have in ten years been set free on proba
| ton and have in the majority Of cases LIVED
up to their promises and given no trouble
! afterward. When drunkard cannot bt
| trusted with his money, yet works witt
! tolerable steadiness so long as he has none
| to spend, the agent may receive his wage!
and give them to his family. One such
| family begged that the system be continued
| indefinitely, FOR it never lived so well wher
! the "old man. took his Saturday wages a!
it had during the sixty days in which h,
had agreed to deliver his envelope to thu
probation officer and so stay out of Jail.
| Nor is this all, for Boston is considering
a plan for the prevention Of crime, and thi
| alone promises for the future of society
| The plan is to weed out from the common
! schools the dull and defective and put then
| into institutions where they will be subject
ed to the best influences. The curfew Law
! works we'll in several towns but the powe
! Of the state to enter homes and schools ant
! begin reforms in season is as yet lacking
| Yet prevention is better than cure.