"If I call upon one to do the work that has formerly been done by another, I stir up ill feelings among the prisoners towards each other, and contention, and they think me hard and unjust. It makes me trouble. They obey my order reluctantly, and say, 'That isn't my work.'"
"If they quarrel, they know the punishment. If they refuse to obey your orders, report them to me, and I will put them where they will be glad to obey." He nodded towards the prison door.
I knew he must refer to some kind of punishment. I did not know what; but frightful visions of the cruelties of which I had read rose in my imagination, and I said no more.
I vowed to myself that I would never get them punished by refusing to obey my unjust exactions if I could help it.
My thoughts did not stop with my words. I reasoned with myself. If my ignorance, or bad management, cause me to be unjust towards those women, and if I, by my injustice, arouse their bad temper so as to cause them to be punished, who will be most in fault? I decided that I should be. The question suggested itself to me—If you get them punished unjustly who will avenge them? The All-seeing-Eye will notice, and avenge it. I will be careful.
I resolved to feel my way along softly and carefully. There was no relief for my dilemma, except in my own ingenuity to find out the ways of the place, and the proper management to apply to it.
II.
AT NIGHT.
At seven o'clock, P. M., came the marching in to supper, and the locking up of all the prisoners.
I looked to see, as they filed past me, one by one, if they carried marks of their crimes upon their faces. I saw nothing unusual in the mass; occasionally an individual countenance betrayed the vicious habits which had brought the woman there. If I had not known that they were convicts, I should never have suspected them to be different from the ordinary poor people who are constantly passing along the streets.
About sixty of the women in the Penitentiary were employed in the shop upon contract vests, pantaloons, coats, and shirts. There were about fifty employed upon sewing-machines. The rest cut, basted, and finished the work.