New York Prison Association.—At the December monthly meeting of the executive committee of the New York Prison Association, the report of the agent of the committee of Detention and Discharged Convicts, showed that during the year then about to close, 5,740 persons committed to the city prisons were “visited and familiarly spoken with” by him. In 1,394 cases, circumstances of extenuation were offered, and hopeful signs exhibited—532 cases were investigated and discontinued on proper representation—551 were discharged from custody as improperly held—679 were relieved by small sums of money till they obtained employment, and 320 were supplied with clothing or employment, or both. The contributions to the funds of the Association during the year were but two thousand dollars!

Deliberate Murder by a Boy under Nine Years of Age.—On the 25th of October, a boy between eight and nine years of age, went to a neighbor’s house while the elder members of the family were absent, and with a gun deliberately shot down a girl about twelve years of age, killing her instantly. The boy, upon being questioned, first said the gun had fallen accidentally and shot her. He subsequently stated that he was mad at her, and had killed her! They had attended school together, and had quarreled. The boy had threatened to shoot the girl, and took this occasion to carry out his threat. The occurrence took place in Montgomery county, Pa., a short distance across the Chester county line, from Valley Forge.

Distribution of Labor in Paris.—A recent inquiry into the occupations of the laboring people of Paris, with a view to ascertain how far public improvements now in progress bear favorably on their interests, shows a very different distribution of labor from that supposed. Of the 360,000 men and women engaged in various trades and handicrafts, it was apprehended that by far the greater part were employed in building operations, as masons, carpenters, joiners, painters, &c., but the late investigation shows that the trade which engrosses the largest amount of hands is that of tailors and workers in ready made articles of clothing. In this branch of industry alone, the recent statistics prove 100,000 out of 360,000 working men and women to be engaged.

New Jersey State Prison.—We learn that there are now confined in the State Penitentiary at Trenton 350 convicts. In many of the cells three prisoners are put together, and some far-seeing newspaper observes, that unless the prison premises are enlarged, there is danger that the separate system, which the law requires to be carried out in the prison, will have to be abandoned! If a man was as near being dead as the separate system is to being violated there, most doctors would give him up.

CONSTITUTION
OF THE
Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons.

When we consider that the obligations of benevolence which are founded on the precepts and examples of the Author of Christianity, are not cancelled by the follies or crimes of our fellow-creatures; and when we reflect upon the miseries which penury, hunger, cold, unnecessary severity, unwholesome apartments, and guilt, (the usual attendants of prisons,) involve with them, it becomes us to extend our compassion to that part of mankind, who are the subjects of those miseries. By the aid of humanity, their undue and illegal sufferings may be prevented; the links which should bind the whole family of mankind together, under all circumstances, be preserved unbroken; and such degrees and modes of punishment may be discovered and suggested, as may, instead of continuing habits of vice, become the means of restoring our fellow-creatures to virtue and happiness. From a conviction of the truth and obligation of these principles, the subscribers have associated themselves under the title of “The Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons.”

For effecting these purposes, they have adopted the following Constitution.