“Well that can be done, of course,” observed one of the warders, who felt some commiseration for the wretched man.
“It must be done.”
“Time enough for that.”
“Penal servitude for life. It’s scandalous.”
The warders were not disposed to continue the conversation; so they marched their prisoner off to his cell.
Peace found he had to mount higher in the world, to the top landing, and he was located on the north side of the wall, he hitherto having been on the south.
The first thing that struck him on entering his new abode was the smell of tar—good, wholesome, honest tar. He had been described in the indictment as a sailor. Why or wherefore was not clearly made manifest.
It is true that he had been on board ship once or twice during his chequered career, but he could not lay claim to being much of a sailor, but he soon found out that his long days of comparative idleness had come to an end.
The smell of the tar gave him a gentle hint of the agreeable process of oakum-picking, this being one of the occupations prison authorities had invented for the amusement of the prisoners under their charge.
The cell was an exact counterpart of the one he had left, except that the dust from the oakum had taken off a good deal of the brilliant cleanliness of the floor and walls.