There are shown to you piles upon piles of loaves of bread—fresh and brown. The guide says: "We bake every day. Nine hundred loaves a day."
The stout woman in purple sighs with amazement, the children gape, the man with the round face has an anxious look—he seems to be a taxpayer.
But not one looks at or thinks of the convict who turns quickly away to hide a thin, white face. To you the guide says: "He's a forger. You can see he's sensitive about being here. Some of them never seem to get used to it." ——
The stout woman in purple is delighted with the enormous copper vats for making the convicts' coffee. She is charmed with the great iron pots for boiling soup.
But you will be more interested in these facts:
There is a great chapel—BUT NO CONVICT IS COMPELLED TO ATTEND.
There is a huge wash room—fitted with showers for the hardy, with porcelain tubs for the old and crippled—AND EVERY MAN IS COMPELLED TO TAKE HIS BATH.
How much of progress, how much that is hopeful for humanity, is told in those words!
Religious services are optional—no more compulsion of man's soul or of his belief.
Bathing IS COMPULSORY. Truly, we progress, and the prison rules prove it.