A WARDER, WITH THE HEAVY CHAINS AND ANKLET WORN BY PRISONERS.
From a Photograph.
I was interested in visiting the prisons of Cetinje and Podgoritza. Both are very small, which speaks well for the state of the country. Few murders are committed, and these are rarely for gain, but usually acts of revenge. The men concerned in the plot were confined at Cetinje, in a small and somewhat primitive building, but when they had been sentenced they were removed to Podgoritza. Both prisons are built round a courtyard in which exercise can be taken, for the doors of the light and roomy cells were open all day long. Nearly every cell contained an oven, and the prisoners were allowed to cook their food themselves. The daily rations consisted of two pounds of bread and the sum of fourpence, with which they could buy what they liked.
I was taken over the place by the Governor, a very kindly-looking giant, who seemed as if he could not hurt a fly. If I am ever unlucky enough to be put under lock and key, I should like to have a jailer just like him. He and a Montenegrin officer, who spoke most excellent French, were very kind in helping me to take photographs. Some of the prisoners wore irons which I rather wanted to photograph, but they thought it might hurt the men’s feelings, so they offered to lend me a jailer to be manacled and snap-shotted. He thought it the greatest joke in the world, and quite entered into the spirit of it all. Just as I was about to press the button he gesticulated wildly. He had remembered that there was a little collection of a dozen or so weapons of warfare in his capacious belt, and these were not at all in keeping with the irons. So he pulled out daggers and pistols galore, and looked quite thin by the time he had finished.
We also visited the prison at Podgoritza, a large town some forty miles from Cetinje. Here we found a strange collection of men and women. There was a saintly-looking pope, who had appropriated the funds of his church. He was dressed in priest’s robes and did the honours of the place. We saw several convicts who were being kept in solitary confinement, and pushed cigarettes to them between the bars. They seemed to feel the boredom most; otherwise they have an easy time. They do little work in summer and still less in winter, and a great part, of the day is spent in sleep. The cells looked far more comfortable than barrack-rooms, and prisoners in Montenegro evidently have little to complain of.
There were ten or twelve women there. These were nearly all guilty of infanticide. When I came into their quarters they rushed at me, seized my hands and kissed them, and tried to make me sit down and talk to them. But, as I could not understand a word they said, and one of them looked very mad, I made my escape as soon as possible.
It will be long before I forget that strange trial, which for spectacular effect might have taken place in Venice in the magnificent Middle Ages. The splendid figures of the judges rivalled the signori in all their glory, and the gigantic soldiery in gay and glowing colour made one almost forget the prisoners, until their primitive, almost savage, behaviour reminded one of their existence and of the fact that even nowadays in Europe things happen that eclipse the achievements of mediæval criminals.