XXXII.

More about the Prison.

THE heavy bolts rattle again, and the crowd of visitors are once more admitted to the "keeper's hall." My thanks are due the clerk, for what I have now learned was an especial favor, and I go to his office. He has not the time nor liberty to bestow upon all a hospital visit. The sick would suffer from the gaze of the curious.

"And did you see the convicts at dinner, after they had marched into the dining-room?" said the clerk, in reply to our thanks.

"I did not, sir."

"If you have the time, we will go and see them." "Thank you; I shall be pleased to do so," was my reply.

We return to the "keeper's hall." A small door, leading into a stairway, and which I had not before observed, was opened for us. We descend into a very large room with a stone floor. The nasal organ is assailed with the savor of the cuisine.

"This is the kitchen," said the clerk. “Here, in this side room, the cooking is done. Those huge iron caldrons are the cooking utensils. them, we feed between seven and convicts three meals daily."

By means of eight hundred

We next entered the dining-room. Here was a sight, indeed, for a novice to wonder at. Eight hundred convicts, men of all grades in crime, age, and education; representatives of all climes, nations, and tongues; and all of them members of the human family, filled with passions, energies, minds, like our own, but, for the time, dead to the world.

The clerk requests me to follow him. We make a half circuit of the room, but it is impossible to hear conversation, on account of the clatter of knives and forks. One thing we notice. The plates are all of wood. If crockery was known here, the breakage for one day would supply the raw material for a meal.

"There is Melville, the forger," said the clerk, putting his mouth close to my ear and speaking in a loud tone.

Once more I looked upon this young man. He was doing his utmost to swallow a few morsels of the plain but wholesome food offered him.

"That young man, I believe, is no more guilty of committing forgery than I," said the clerk.

I was surprised at this remark; but as I subsequently learned, it is remarkable how accurately and quickly prison officers of long standing can detect real and assumed innocence in a convict. The officers seldom express these convictions. On this occasion, however, the clerk had evidently given Melville his heartfelt sympathy, a circumstance which was to benefit him afterwards.

"Now, sir, if you desire to take a walk of about three-quarters of a mile, we will make a circuit of the prison walls."

This kindness on the part of the clerk, it was difficult for me to accept. I feared he was offering more than I ought to take advantage of.

"No sir," said he, in reply to my objections; "I am not in perfect condition for work to-day, and the exercise will be a practical advantage to me. Do not let me make my offer a trespass upon your time, however."

I accepted his kindness without further remark, and we proceeded at once to the front gate, where I had first entered the prison. Here, on each side of the immense iron gate, and each forming part of the wall, are two large towers, built of cut stone. The walls proper are built of hewn stone. In the southern tower is the gate-keeper's lodge. In the northern tower is a spiral staircase, forming a communication with the top of the wall. This staircase we ascended. It would be impossible to incorporate into the text of this history the really magnificent views constantly recurring to the pedestrian, making the circuit of the main wall inclosing the Auburn State Prison. The wall forms an oblong square, seemingly, five hundred by twelve hundred feet. These distances are only approximate; but they are very near the truth. To describe the impression made on the mind by this walk is a difficult task for the pen. The vastness of this structure fills the mind with awe. It incloses all the necessities requisite for a score of manufactories, complete in all their parts, together with an immense hotel, or boarding-house, capable of sustaining and providing lodgment for thousands. Each and every part of the structures within the walls bears the evidences which speak of the strengt necessary to con

fine vice, wickedness and crime. Without, there is a contrast; as far as the eye can reach, are the emblems of freedom; earth, air, homes, beautiful shadetrees, and, in the distance, stately forests and fields of waving corn; to the south, numerous church spires point towards heaven where the convicted felon, judge, jurors, citizens, all must congregate on the great and final day; to the east, a stately and solid structure, where, our companion informs us, students of theology, in one of the Christian denominations, are made ambassadors of the good news to man. Is the contrast fearful? We have endeavored to picture the facts of this walk. Will the reader, as he gazes upon the scene, try to which they teach?

learn the important lessons

We have now reached the middle of the western wall.

"But what is that wall beyond this?"

"That,” replied the clerk, "incloses part of the State property; and there, to the left, is the burial ground of the prison. It has been secured to meet the wants of a sovereignty growing like the Empire State, and will be necessary at a future day. As nations wax fat, criminals multiply."

XXXIII.

James Mordaunt, Esq., triumphs.

"WHAT is the hour, father?" said Bell Mortimer, as she entered the ladies' parlor at B's Hotel, in the city of U.

'It it now seven o'clock."

"Has any news arrived from the village of W-?"

"Nothing definite, Bell. The jury, it is understood, have agreed upon a verdict. It will be rendered this morning at the opening of the court. We shall get all the particulars by eleven o'clock.”

"Cannot you order a carriage, father, and let me be present at this last scene of James Mordaunt's triumph?"

"No, Bell. I must ask you to rest content with what I have already conceded in coming with you, and assisting in this defence. The labor, too, has been a useless waste of time, for the testimony against Melville is so overwhelming, there is no hope for him. He must go to prison, Bell."

"George says he is innocent, father."

"He may be; but innocence and the testimony against him are opposite poles on the earth. He went to his room, the very room opposite the one you now