ALIMONY CLUB.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1743, 7 May 1913, Page 4

ALIMONY CLUB.

HUSBANDS' LIFE- IN A PKISON HOTEL. In an amusing Teport presented on March 21 to Mr. Gaynor, Mayor of New York, the Commissioners of Accounts call attention to the existeucb in New York of "tho most luxurious gaol in tho world." Each of the prisoners incarcerated In this prison, it is stated, costs the city on an average .£735 a ycnr. They live on a scale that could not easily be improved upon in the finest hotels, their personal wants being attended to by numerous warders who act as valets, while four skilled and highly-paid cooks provide them with an excellent cuisine. jiudlovr Street Gaol is the name of this curious penal institution, but it is popularlv known as "the Alimony Club," Because the greater number of its inmates are recalcitrant husbands convicted for the non-payment of alimony. Insolvent debtors and militiamen who have neglected to pay their regimental fees aro also confined in "the Alimony Club." Each prisoner is provided with a suito of comfortablo cells. None of them wants to leave. "The atmosphere of the Ludlow Street Gaol," says ono report, "is ■ akin to that of mediaeval monasteries, where tho monks lived care-freo a retired life far from tho maddening struggle existence," Baths, a library, and even nn organ aro provided for the prisoner?. They pass the timo reading, writing, or playing cards. BETTER THAN THE MAUKETANIA. One prisoner described life in the resort ns a rest cure. "The only restrictions," ho said, "are thoso which obtain in any good sanatorium. I'd rather live hero than in the Mauretanin. 'We have long sleeping hours, plenty of exercise in tho open air, no mental or physical strain, and an abundance of good, nourishing food magnificently prepared." Another prisoner declared that ho had been in hotels all over the world, and added: Tvo never found one where I got such prompt, pain-taking attention. The keepers aro more like the orderlies of an officers' mess or the stewards of a first-class club than ' illustration of tho attractions of "the Alimony Club," Sheriff Harburger narrates that lie recently secured tho release of a woman who had refused to pay ,£2flo damages for alienating Hie affections of another woman's husband. She reproached him bitterly, saying that slio had never been so comiortably housed and fed in her life. The Commissioners .Recommend radical changes in the administration of New York's "gaol de luxe."