DEAN.
Only fourteen years had rolled over this boy's head, when he became a prisoner in Windsor on a sentence of three years. Rude, but not vicious—lively without design—and less experienced than a man of sixty, he was a promising victim for the irrespective discipline of that dreary place. He soon took up his abode in the solitary cell, and there, young as he was, he spent much of his time, both in summer and winter. Fifteen days at a time has that little boy been in the cell in the dead of winter, with only one blanket, and a piece of bread not larger than his hand once in a day. All night long have I heard him cry, and plead to be let out, that he might not freeze; but no reply could he get from the keeper but—"Stop your noise—shut your head—learn to keep out—I hope you'll freeze."
To say nothing about the impropriety and unmercifulness of such conduct to any prisoner, how does it appear in a man of sufficient years to know better, towards a small boy. Would Lucifer himself have treated even a young christian so? Every one knew that Dean was by no means a bad boy; he was thoughtless and imprudent, but never did he deserve such cruel treatment. Indeed such punishments as are properly called cruel, cannot be constitutionally inflicted on any one, much less on a boy; nor for any offence, much less for a trifle. I here hold up to the view of humanity this tortured youth—his ears frozen, his limbs shivering, his fingers numb and red as blood, pinched with hunger, exhausted by exercise to prevent freezing to death, and dying for want of sleep. I hold him up in this predicament, amid the gloom of the solitary cell for some trifling error, at the dark and silent hour of midnight, in the cold months of winter, pleading for his life, and comforted only by this snarling reply of the guard, "Stop your noise." Yes, I hold him up in such circumstances, where I have often heard his piercing cries, and ask the beholders to read in him the common mercy of that "merciful Institution."
This is a penitentiary. It was erected as such. The laws consider it in this light. It is made the duty of the officers to have an especial eye, in all their conduct, to the moral reformation of the prisoners. How inconsistent, then, must such conduct be? Can such cruelty on any person do him any good? Rather would not such treatment have the effect, even on a saint, to make him a sinner? But look at the punishment of this little boy. What he endured would have crushed a giant. No account made of his age and inexperience—no thought of the kind and degree of correction suited to him—no feelings of compassion; but the steel-hearted man, who ought to have thought of his own children of the same age, met this young unthinking trespasser on some of the minor rules of the limbo, like a hungry bear, and threw him into the infernal machinery of his vengeance.
CHAMBERLAIN.
This man was a harmless lunatic. He never offered the least violence to any one, and was as unfit a subject of punishment as is commonly found. He did not, as might have been expected of any one in his situation, attend very closely to his work, and what he did do, was not very well done. By this he came under the letter of that common law which makes no allowance for bodily or mental imperfections, and was introduced to the solitary cell. He now found a home, and he soon became perfectly acclimated, and seemed not to care whether he was in the cell or out of it. When it was found that he was contented in that place, he was let out, and doomed to wear a block and chain; and between these two modes of suffering, he was kept in constant vibration. There was no feeling in the hearts of his punishers. What though God had set his mark on him in the ruin of his mind, and thus by his own signet commended him to the sympathy and protection of his fellow-men? What though no being on earth could give him a moment's penal suffering without trampling on all the principles of right, and propriety, and law, and insulting the majesty of Heaven in the abuse of its subjects? They had the power, and they gloried in its unfeeling and most outrageous abuse.
As an evidence of the manner in which this poor lunatic was used, I will relate an illustrative circumstance.
He was lying one day on the ground, with his huge block and chain by his side. The keeper went to him and said, "Chamberlain, you must go into the solitary cell." "I must?" said he; "let me see. I have been out—one—two—three days—yes, it is time; I have not been out so long before this great while."
I would not dwell on these gloomy sketches—I could not prevail on myself to torture the public mind by the recital of such abusive, inhuman, and infamous acts, did I not hope, by this means, to do something that may ultimately effect a cure for these evils. This is to be done only by holding up the evils, in all their dimensions and enormity, to the eye of the public; and painful as is the task, I hope God will give me strength to support it, and to go on untiring, till the object is accomplished. These representations of human misery ought to elicit human sympathy, and inspire human effort for their removal. I know the things that I write; I have tasted the wormwood and the gall; and though my heart sickens at the remembrance of these things, still I have put my hand to the plough, and I will not look back.