A PRISON PESTHOUSE.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3796, 14 September 1883, Page 4

A PRISON PESTHOUSE.

Tho condition of the Roltncst Prison (never was an apter name), Western Australia., where native prisoners are confined, lias attracted considerable attention of late. The Perth Inquirer writes: — " Poor wretches, suddenly removed from a tropical climate, to be confined on a cold, spraybeaten island, situated 1,000 miles south of their own district, have been attacked by an epidemic, from the effects of which they hiivc been dying off like fluke-rotted sheep. What has been the state of these afflicted prisoners thus struck down by the ravages of a cruel disease engendered by the effect upon their systems of an (to them) naturally cold and humid climate r They have been housed like pigs; they _ have been treated worse than dogs. Lying in their own filth, from which they were too weak to even crawl, insufficiently clad, improperly fed, without tho necessary skilled medical attendance, they have died—died under conditions of indescribable horror, which ought to bring down the vengeance of their Maker upon the heads of those whose callous neglect has allowed such a state of things to occur. Even when dead the poor wretches arc not at rest. There is a burial ground on the island, in which the bodies of the dead are buried deep enough only for tho earth to little morothan cover them. There are pigs on the island also, tho gate of tho cemetery is more frequently open than shut, the pigs arc allowed to roam about, and but wo will not disgust the public by entering into any more details."