and make their escape in a body. I was not considered "safe" for the job, and knew nothing of it until it had miscarried. The chief conspirator was my friend the "cracksman," who made tools out of portions of his bedstead, that opened not only the lock of our own cell, but that of every other cell in the prison, if required. The prisoners were generally in couples in each cell at that time, and the plan agreed upon was as follows: One of the convicts was an old man subject to fits, and it was arranged that he was to feign a fit for the occasion; the assistance of the night officer was to be called, who was to have his "light put out" by the fellow prisoner of the one in fits, who was a strong muscular fellow. Meanwhile the "cracksman," whose cell was opposite, was to unlock the cell doors of all the prisoners in the plot. This dark and desperate scheme was frustrated, however, by a little lad, who had heard two of the convicts conversing about it. His term of imprisonment expired on the day preceding the night fixed for the accomplishment; and he gave information to the governor, who placed officers with fire-arms in the ward all night. Next morning the suspected prisoners were searched, and the lock-picking instruments were found on the "cracksman," and there the affair ended. The only result which followed the discovery of the plot, so far as I could discover, was that we were removed from this prison to England rather earlier than we otherwise should have been.
Previous to our removal, the governor, who was a very sensible man compared with those under whom I was afterwards placed, told me that I was about to be sent to England along with some of the worst characters he had ever known; that they were all leaving the prison with the character of conspirators, except myself; that he had given me the best character he could give to any prisoner, and that he hoped and believed I would reap the benefits attaching to good conduct, and be liberated long before my companions. But I was not born under a fortunate star. Almost all my companions had longer sentences than I had. Bob and the cracksman had two years longer; but as they managed to secure the convict's prize, they were sent out to Australia, and were liberated, I believe, two years before me. Some prisoners with sentences twice as long as mine were also liberated earlier than I was; and I remember alluding to this circumstance in a letter to my friends, written when I had been about four years and a-half in prison; and for doing so my letter was suppressed.
The night of my departure for England at last arrived, and I found myself for the first time placed in heavy leg-irons, along with eleven others. We were put into the prison-van for the railway station; and as soon as we were seated in the carriage there commenced a scene which baffles all description. Some of my fellow-prisoners commenced shouting, some screamed and laughed, others mocked and jeered, whilst above all curses loud and deep hurtled through the stifling air, and made night hideous with the sound. Their yells and oaths still ring in my ears, and that which was to my companions a scene of the utmost jollity and mirth was to me the nearest approach to hell my imagination had ever conceived. It was a cold spring night that witnessed my degrading departure; when I arrived at my destination in Yorkshire one of my legs was considerably swollen. It is a cold spring night now; that swollen limb has for years been in the tomb, and the dismembered trunk, on its "Ticket of Leave," has not yet returned to its long-lost home.
CHAPTER IV.
MY ARRIVAL AT THE YORKSHIRE PRISON—IN SIMPLICITER NATURALIBUS—GET ANIMAL FOOD—MEDICAL TREATMENT—STATUESQUE CHRISTIANITY—REMOVED TO THE HOSPITAL—DEATH OF A PRISONER—MY LEG GETS MUCH WORSE—REMOVAL TO SURREY PRISON.
On my arrival at the Yorkshire prison I and my companions were subjected to a new, and to me most painful operation. I am quite well aware that it would be next to useless, if not quite hypocritical, in one in my position to lay claim to any considerable delicacy of feeling, or to appear to be over scrupulous in matters of common decency. But there will occasionally, however, be found even amongst convicts those who will bear a pretty long period of imprisonment, during which they are subjected to a variety of contaminating influences, and yet not have their moral sensibilities completely destroyed. Of these I was one, and I felt that the treatment which I had now to undergo was conceived in a barbarous spirit, and was well-fitted to destroy utterly any feelings of self-respect which my previous experiences had still left me. Every part of my body was minutely inspected immediately on my arrival, in order that I might not take any money or tobacco into the prison.
Doubtless it is very desirable, and even necessary, that every precaution should be taken to prevent such articles finding their way into prisons—at least on the persons of prisoners—but the fact remains that, notwithstanding these inspections, both money and tobacco do find their way into prison, and are every day in common use amongst the prisoners. Prisoners will have tobacco, and tobacco cannot be got without money, so that both must be obtained; and the result has been that the more rigorous the inspection, the greater the ingenuity required to evade it. The trials of skill and invention which goes on between the convict and the inspector, like those between artillery and iron plates, have as yet only proved that, given the power of resistance, the power of overcoming it will be found. One of my fellow-prisoners verified the truth of this conclusion by taking five sovereigns into prison with him, notwithstanding all the care and experience exercised by the inspector.
I now got the first taste of animal food I had had for about ten months. So keen was my appetite that I could have relished any cooked carrion even, if it had come in my way. I also got potatoes, the very skins of which I devoured with great gusto. It was very curious that at this time I preferred salt to sugar, or anything that was sweet, and I used to suck little lumps of salt for the first few days I had the opportunity of doing so with as much relish as children do their sugar plums. The bread at this prison was excellent, and the food generally of good quality.
The day after my arrival I was ordered to strip a second time for the medical inspection, and as a considerable time elapsed before my turn came, I had to remain standing in that state with my swollen leg rather longer than was good for me. When the inspection was concluded my leg was ordered to be bandaged, and some medicine was given to me daily. I now had my hair cut in the approved prison fashion, and was put into a cell to sew mats, in a standing posture. In this employment, relieved by a short period of daily out-of-door exercise, I passed one of the three and a-half months I was in this prison. The two chaplains before whom I was taken shortly after my arrival, were extremely kind to me during the whole time I remained. One of them had done much good among the prisoners, and had been of great service to many of them by getting them employment after they were liberated; thus removing the greatest obstacle in the way of a permanent reformation of the prisoner.
I recollect the first Sunday I spent in this prison. I was very nearly getting reported to the governor for a very unintentional violation of the prison rules. In accordance with these rules, convicts were not allowed to turn their heads in any direction in chapel, and if they did so they were taken by the attendant officer before the governor, who punished them for disobedience. I cannot but suppose that those who framed these rules had some good end in view, in being so stringent in the matter of posture in the religious services. The difficulty with me was to discover whether the spiritual welfare of the prisoners, or the preservation of a more than military discipline amongst them, even in matters of religion, had appeared to them to be of the greater importance.
It is probable, however, that neither of these considerations decided the question, but that the principal object of these regulations was to preserve in the convict mind, even in the act of worship, the idea of punishment in a perfectly lively and healthy condition. Be that as it may, on my first Sunday in chapel, with my English prayer-book before me, which was then quite new to me, I found myself quite unable to follow the chaplain in the services in which he was engaged, and to which I was also a perfect stranger. Turning over the leaves of the prayer-book, in the vain attempt to find out the proper place, and happening to cast my eyes over the shoulder of the prisoner in front of me in order to find it, the movement caught the eye of the officer, who sat watching every face, and I saw from his stare, and the frown which gathered under it,
