Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison Part 33

The blackness of darkness was round about me. Infinite despair stood ready to seize me. It seemed an amazement that life should be forced to remain with him who longs for death, who would rejoice exceedingly and be glad could he find the grave. But when the first horrible numbness of the shock was disappearing, when the first glimmering perception came to me that "as a man's day so shall his strength be," I began to suspect, and soon to know, that in many ways the reality was not so terrible as imagination pictured it.

However ample the provision be which men may make to inflict suffering upon other men, however well and successfully they may apply the provision, they cannot alter men's nature. That will a.s.sert itself under all circ.u.mstances. The fact that a man is restrained of his liberty by no means alters his nature. The things he liked or disliked when he was at liberty he will like or dislike when a prisoner, and he is not long in finding that "whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap" is just as certainly true of the seed he plants in inclosed ground as it is of what he scatters in the open field.

CHAPTER XLVI.

IF PAIN IS NOT AN EVIL, IT CERTAINLY IS A VERY GOOD IMITATION.

The world inside of the walls has a public opinion of its own, and it is at least quite as often just as the public opinion whose sphere is not circ.u.mscribed by stone walls and iron bars. The man who accepts the situation, resolved to get his hand as easily as possible out of the tiger's mouth, soon becomes known as a sensible fellow, willing to give others no trouble and anxious to have no trouble given him. Such a man will rarely be molested.

Patient, uncomplaining endurance always excites pity and sympathy. The most ignorant, the most brutal warder will scarcely oppress the man who goes quietly and unresistingly along the th.o.r.n.y road stretched out before him; who, not taking the thorns for roses, is not disappointed at finding few roses among the thorns.

Those, however, who are determined to see the rough side of prison life may easily do so; the appliances are there and they will certainly be accommodated. An English prison is a vast machine in which a man counts for just nothing at all. He is to the establishment what a bale of merchandise is to a merchant's warehouse. The prison does not look upon him as a man at all. He is merely an object which must move in a certain rut and occupy a certain niche provided for it. There is no room for the smallest sentiment. The vast machine of which he is an item keeps undisturbed upon its course.

Move with it, and all is well. Resist, and you will be crushed as inevitably as the man who plants himself on the railroad track when the express is coming. Without pa.s.sion, without prejudice, but also without pity and without remorse, the machine crushes and pa.s.ses on. The dead man is carried to his grave and in ten minutes is as much forgotten as though he had never existed.

The plank bed, the crank, the bread-and-water diet, unauthorized but none the less effectual clubbing at the hands of warders, the cold in the punishment cells penetrating to the very marrow of the bones, weakness, sickness and unpitied death are the certain portion of the rebel.

Some are found idiotic enough to invite such a fate, though fewer now than formerly. The progress of education in England during the last twenty years, and the philanthropic efforts of many societies and private persons, but above all the covert but successful efforts of the authorities to deport them to this country instantly after their release, have had an immense effect in thinning the ranks of prison inmates. The Judges, too, have been forced by public opinion to be much less severe than they used to be, and that counts for much even in the inside of prisons.

Nothing can be more capricious than the sentences they pa.s.s. In very few cases does the law set any limit. "Life or any term not less than five years" is the usual reading of the statute books, and the consequence naturally is that one Judge will give his man five years, while another will condemn his to twenty years for precisely the same crime committed under precisely the same circ.u.mstances as the first one.

Another great blot on the English judicial system is that no court of appeal exists to which a sentence might be referred for review, so that the most unjust and unequal sentences are constantly pa.s.sed from which there is no appeal but in the forlorn hope--rather, entire hopelessness--of a pet.i.tion to the Home Secretary. I have often seen a man who had been sentenced to five years for murder working by the side of another whose sentence was twenty years for some crime against property. Such contrasts, of course, excite great discontent, and in some cases are the reason why men set up a hopeless resistance to what they feel to be persecution and injustice.

It always seemed to me that the standpoint of the Board of Directors, established in 1864, and which continued without change until very recently, was altogether wrong. They appeared to think that in their dealings with other men the only course was to be the application of "force, iron force," as one of the governors expressed it. The very great majority require no such application, and the few difficult ones could easily be managed in another way. Certainly it is necessary that all prison discipline be penal, but it is not necessary that it be ferocious and inhuman, as certainly is the English. Starvation, the crank, the plank bed, the fearful cold of the cells are not measures necessary in dealing with any man.

Whatever they could think of to harden, to degrade, to insult, to inflict every form of suffering, both physical and mental, which a man could undergo and live, was embodied in the rules they made. Their prisons were to be places of suffering and of nothing but suffering.

So far as the directors were concerned the regulations were carried out to the letter, but each prison is under the control of a resident governor, with a deputy governor to a.s.sist him. These gentlemen are always men of good social position, retired officers of the army, who have seen the world and have experience in controlling men. They are rarely inclined to unnecessary severity, but are generally willing to apply the rules with as much consideration as such rules admit. The governor's discretion, however, is limited, but daily contact more or less with men whom he sees to differ very little from free men, and whom he sometimes finds to be even better than many he knows who are not, but who perhaps ought to be, on the wrong side of the bars, makes him unwilling to throw too many sharp points on the path which has to be trodden by men for whom he often cannot help feeling considerable sympathy.

I have more than once heard governors express their disapproval of the starvation system and of the ferocity of treatment toward men who some day or other must go back to society.

Under such governors the new arrival speedily finds out that to a certain extent his comfort depends upon himself. No man can make a bad thing good or trick himself into believing that suffering is pleasure.

If pain be not an evil, it is an exceedingly good imitation, and the wisest philosopher is just as restless under the toothache as the most perfect idiot.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PENTONVILLE PRISON.]

CHAPTER XLVII.

HIS ROW BECOMES FILLED WITH VERY SHARP-EDGED STONES INDEED.

The inhabitant of a cell has a very rough row to hoe under any circ.u.mstance, and it has to be hoed, but there is no necessity for him to fill his row with stones and to plant roots in it himself. He soon finds his level, and the impression he makes on his arrival is the one which, as a rule, clings to him to the end.

When prison air and prison influence have succeeded in incasing a man with the sort of moral hardbake that renders him callous to those feelings which at first so gall the raw spots, he finds himself watching with curiosity the shapings of newcomers. Some announce immediately on arrival that they cannot possibly be there more than a month or two; their arrest was a mistake, and their uncle, the member of Parliament, is now busily engaged making representations to the Home Secretary. One of the very few amus.e.m.e.nts prisoners have is in watching the important fellows, the men whose friends could do so much for them if they would only let them know where they are. Sometimes a chap who has perhaps been a body servant or something of the kind, who has picked up the kind of veneer he could catch by aping his master, will furnish food for smiles to every one he comes in contact with during his stay. He never receives a letter without explaining confidentially to every one that another aunt whose favorite he was has just died, leaving him 10,000 in cash, not to speak of a trifle or two in the shape of half a dozen houses.

These gentlemen are immediately furnished with a name which becomes much better known than their own, and whenever they have delivered themselves of their periodical brooding of lies the news goes smiling round that Billy Treacle's aunt has died again and left him another fortune.

So long as their inventions do no more harm than make them ridiculous, they are only laughed at and let alone, but when one of them develops a talent for invention which molests or injures others, especially when it takes the form of confidential communication to the governor of what he sees, and still more of what he does not see, such retribution as both prisoners and officers can inflict is not long in falling. His row becomes filled with very sharp-edged stones indeed, and roots which tear his hands painfully. Nearly always these boastings are fathered by an absurd vanity--a desire ever to appear what they are not, and while they think they are deceiving others they deceive no one but themselves.

One case I remember, though, was an exception. One young fellow made such use of his invention, and the story is so interesting and instructive as showing with what lofty respect English gentlemen are educated for the rights of property, that I shall relate it.

Four or five years after I went to Chatham a young fellow named Frederick Barton arrived with a ten years' sentence for forgery. His appearance and manners were very much in his favor, and his conduct so confirmed the good first impression that he speedily became a favorite with everybody from the governor down.

Some three years had slipped by when one day he asked me if I would prepare a pet.i.tion which he might send to the Home Secretary in the hope of obtaining a commutation of sentence. I liked the youngster very well and readily consented, but told him that I doubted very much if he would get anything. The pet.i.tion was sent, and in a few days the usual answer was returned, "No grounds." He told me of his ill luck, and I said to him: "Look here, so long as you send up whining pet.i.tions asking for mercy both you and they will be treated with contempt. If you wish to get that English gentleman in the Home Office to do anything for you, make him believe you are a millionaire; you will see whether he will do anything then for you or not." He laughed merrily at that. "A millionaire! Why, I haven't a sixpence. My father is only a private coachman at Tunbridge Wells." "That is nothing at all," I said; "if you will be guided by me, and let me manage things for you, I will have a pet.i.tion sent in for you from the outside, and I feel sure we can get you out." An idea had just flashed into my mind, and I was eager to try it.

At first he was a little timid about the venture, fearing that I might get him into trouble, but when he became convinced that I would do nothing of the kind he consented. I had a warder in the prison who in consideration of an occasional tip used to act as my postman, sending my letters to my friends and bringing in theirs to me. This was a deadly offense against the rules, but as the permitted correspondence was outrageously limited I saw no reason why I should deprive myself of letters when I had the chance to have them, and as I took good care that the great men in London should get no inkling of my misdeeds I dare say their hearts did not grieve after what their eyes did not see.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

HE TELEGRAPHED THE NEWS TO MY WARDER, AND BARTON WENT ON HIS WAY REJOICING.

My warder friend supplied me with writing materials. I prepared one letter, which I had him copy, and another in my own handwriting. Both were directed to Barton, and informed him that his rich uncle had lately died and had left him one hundred and sixty thousand pounds in money and sixteen thousand acres of cotton land in India. He was also informed that his father had gone to India to look after the property, and that upon his return a pet.i.tion would be presented to the Home Secretary, who it was hoped would grant his release. These two letters my warder sent to a friend of mine in London with a note from me requesting him to post them immediately. I told Barton what I had done, at the same time cautioning him to guard the closest secrecy. Two days afterward the letters arrived, and I directed my protege to spread the news as much as possible, to tell all the warders he saw and to show them his letters.

We had at that time in the prison a wideawake but tricky fellow named George Smith. He had been clerk to an important firm of auctioneers in London, and had been sentenced by probably the most savage judge on the bench, Commissioner Ker, to fourteen years' imprisonment for receiving a quant.i.ty of stolen silverware, which he had his employers sell for him.

He was about to be released, and I determined to make use of him, but without letting him know the truth, for I knew that if he suspected he was merely doing a good turn for the chum he left behind him, he, like the Home Secretary himself, without the right kind of inducement would have left his friend to stop where he was until the bottomless pit was frozen over hard enough to hold a barbecue on it. Barton, by my directions, told Smith of his good fortune, and that he hoped on his father's return to be liberated. Smith then did exactly what I expected and wanted him to do. He said there was no need to wait until then; he was going to be released in a few days, and "if you like I will send in a pet.i.tion for you; it can't do you any harm, and it may get you released immediately." Barton at once accepted the offer, and told him that if successful the post of manager on the Indian estate would be at his disposal. He also suggested to ask me to write the pet.i.tion. Smith managed to see me in the course of the day, and, supposing me to have no knowledge of the matter, explained the situation and asked me to write the pet.i.tion. Needless to say, I promised everything asked for, and added that I would make it my business to have the pet.i.tion in London at some place where he could find it the day of his discharge.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BANK-NOTE STORE-ROOM, BANK OF ENGLAND.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: VISITORS AT NEWGATE STANDING OVER THE BURYING-VAULT DOOR LEADING TO THE BLACK-MARIA.]

The pet.i.tion was prepared, setting forth all the interesting facts for the edification of the right honorable gentleman in the Home Office, and after being submitted to Barton and Smith, sent to the latter's address in London.

Millbank is a gigantic prison in the heart of London every one of the thousand cells of which cost the Government 300 to build. This is the establishment where David Copperfield visited Mr. Uriah Heep when that gentleman was under a cloud, and heard him express the wish that "everybody might get 'took up' so that they could learn the error of their ways." For many years all London men whose sentences had expired were brought here for release, and here Smith came a few days after the pet.i.tion was posted. On the morning of his discharge and within an hour after pa.s.sing through the gates of Millbank he left the pet.i.tion personally at the Home Office. Two days afterward one of the clerks acknowledged its receipt, accompanied with the gratifying a.s.surance that it was under consideration. A week later Mr. Smith was notified that the release would be granted. He immediately telegraphed the news to my warder, who told me, and I told Barton. Two days more and the release came down, Barton went on his way rejoicing and every one was glad at his happy fortune. The only one who felt much disappointment was very likely poor Smith, who never heard of his friend again.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SCHOOL AND A TRADE, OR JAIL.]

CHAPTER XLIX.

I Fl.u.s.tER THE GREAT JUPITER OF MY LITTLE WORLD.

The successful issue of this little enterprise gave me great satisfaction. There was, of course, nothing in it for me, nor did I want anything, but it furnished me with an excellent standpoint from which to address the Home Secretary should the occasion ever arise.

The occasion did arise some time after, and I utilized it in this way: A friend of mine had come over from America to see me and to try if it were not possible to obtain some reduction in the sentence. My postman warder was away at the moment, so letter-carrier facilities were cut off. I wanted very much indeed to communicate with my friend, and applied to the Home Secretary explaining the position and asking him to let me write two letters immediately. At the end of eight weeks an answer came back that the Home Secretary had carefully considered the application and could find no sufficient grounds for advising Her Majesty to grant the prayer thereof. The next day I obtained a pet.i.tion sheet from the governor and wrote the following pet.i.tion:

"To the Right Hon. Sir William V. Harcourt, Secretary of State for the Home Department: