| Whole No. in prison. | Average sentence. | ||||||
| In | Conn. | 189, | March 31, 1841, | 7 | yrs. | 3 | mos. |
| Va. | 181, | Sept 30, 1839, | 6 | " | 10 | " | |
| Mass. | 322, | Sept. 30, 1840, | 5 | " | 9 | " | |
| La. | 68, | Sept 30, 1839, | 5 | " | 1 | " | |
| N. J. | 152, | Sept. 30, 1840, | 4 | " | 7 | " | |
| Ky. | 162, | Sept. 30, 1839, | 4 | " | |||
| D. C. | 79, | Nov. 30, 1840, | 3 | " | 8 | " | |
| Md. | 104, | 3 | " | ||||
| Phila. | 129, | Sept. 30, 1840, | 2 | " | 5 | " | |
The difference between the average term of punishment in Connecticut and Philadelphia is 300 per cent! If the same result is effected by each, there has then been a great amount of gratuitous suffering in one case.
[35] I refer to the prisons at Stretton-upon-Dunmore in Warwickshire, that at Horn near Hamburg, and the one at Mettray near Tours in France. The French penal code allows the guardian or relatives of an offender under age to take him from prison on giving bonds for his good behavior. While these pages were first passing through the press, I learned the happy effect which followed the execution of the license laws in this city. In 1846, from the 10th of March to the 24th of April, there were sent to the House of Correction for intemperance one hundred eighty-nine persons. During the same period of the year 1847, only eighty-four have been thus punished! But alas, in 1851 the evil has returned, and the demon of drunkenness mows down the wretched in Boston with unrestricted scythe.