By and large, Sound, that lusty runagate, had a much easier time of it here than his ethereal brother Light. The inmates of Newgate loved Sound, and never let off making as much of it as they could. Partly it was the want of Light, which made Sound their only medium for the exchange of intelligence, or, as the case might be, stupidity. And partly it was that everyone in the place—rich, poor, felon, debtor, male, female, adult, child—had the means of making noise with every movement, in that they all wore iron fetters from the moment they were admitted to when they were discharged. Rich could afford light chains, poor must make do with heavy, but chains they all had, and they loved to make them clink and rattle. As if sheer volume of noise might shake the stench from the air, and scare away the lice.