The San Francisco call., 1910-04-03

spot where they form in line TO march
to their toll OF these felons there
were several hundred; among them
several score of long termers whose
names are still fresh in the publics
memory for ugly deeds-men whom we
look upon as problems when we choose
70 think Of them sympathetically. This
crowd of stripe clad thieves and thugs
and recidivists and petty wrongdoers
and luckless accidental violators Of
statutes was hurrying up a flight of
stairs Walking in the opposite direc-
tion we descended those stairs.
1t is not hard to get that picture
the convicts. massing like all crowds
in a CONSTRUCTED place, jostling elbows,
rubbing bodies, so that there was
scant room to pass among them; so
that passing thus we bumped against
them, we met with those semicollisions
and. unexpected bodily encounters that
come in crowds. All of us-the throng
of convicts, the warden and the writer
were hemmed in on either side by a
stone wall They fastening in one
direction in stripes; we two. marked
by citizens clothing, hurrying in the
other.
HoyIe went ahead. He set the pace
and the route. He plunged into the
crowd. into the midst of them, where
their heads and bodies hid him from
guards, where they touched him with
their bodies and touched him with
their hands and touched him when he
could not of any possibility see who
Il was who came in contact with him.
He led the way into the middle of the
throng-the several hundred in stripes,
among whom were the several score
Of bad ones" And he did not so
much as embarrass them; they were
used TO it.
Some men viii appreciate this fact
more than others. 1t was no grand
stand" play l know from others who
know Of their own knowledge that he
does It every day. Prison wardens, yard
captafns. police officers and others who
deal with felons behind bars will find it
hardest TO believe. For the average
reader let me say that If many an able,
conscientious man holding Hoyle's Of
fee were to make habit of doing that
fnlnR IN utdIAS any Ol4ACA CilOdn
prison today-or were to have done it
in San. Quentin prison in days gone
bv-those who saw him do ii would say
that life had come to weary him.
Warden Hoyle did it as an everyday
matter. as il is with him. He did il
sust as he walked through the jute mill
afterward and just as he walked
through the new dollhouse, where stripe
clad laborers were handling heavy iron
tools and masses of concrete on scaf-
foldings directly above his head. All
these things he did. smiling and talking
and looking not once behind him. It
was hard to believe IL, seeing it.
1t was hard to realize that this was
San Quentin prison. where they had.
but yesterday, regular hours for the
straitjacket. where, save one man
Martin Aguirre-no warden has dared
20 make a practice of going down alone
into the yard, where men In stripes
have become monsters incarnate,
whence killers have gone forth. 1t was
hard to realize this was the same place,
and to know that the change had come
within three years.
n Veto go back-Warden Hoyle Is
not what we nowadays call reformer
He has written no treatises or books;
nor is his name connected with any
Of those efficient and hard working Or
CARNATIONS which are accomplishing
good things for man. As matter of
plain, hard fact, he is what you might
call a politician-in the words better
Eense-a practical politician before he