The Evening Star SATURDAY, MAY 9, 1874

Evening Star, Issue 3498, 9 May 1874, Page 2

The Evening Star SATURDAY, MAY 9, 1874

Persons who visit the Dunedin gaol will, as a rule, have two ideas firmly impressed upon their minds. One is, ithat everything about the ’ gaol that ' depends on the governor and his staff ■alone is most satisfactorily managed; hut that those matters connected with ' it which are beyond their control are ;for the most part in a ,-very unsar tisfactory condition. For instance, no lOne^can.gcrthrough. the prison without ;being struck by the entire absence of evil sniells in any part of the establishment, except one, and that comes from the Bay, or rather from the mudflat which lines it: this of course gives forth its characteristic odor, so well known to the inhabitants of Dunedin. This naturally leads us to speak of the site of the gaol. Beyond all doubt a worse one could hardly have been selected. If, indeed, it is ; thought desirable that the prisoners

should live m the most unhealthy spot that can be found, so that the term of their natural lives may be shortened as much as possible, the, present’ site is a very suitable one.' We feel certain that no one can live for r any length of time so near a mass, of decaying animat and vegetable matter—-for the mud flat referred to is nothing else’ than this—without haying .his vital very much depressed. If, however, a gaol ought to be looked upon as a sort of hospital for those who are suffering

from mortal diseases, and thatr is undoubtedlythe most benevolent as well S& most rational 1 way of looking at the matter, it would seem that it is above all tilings necessary that the prisoners should not be exposed to any' influences that can tend to lower , their physical tone—except, of course, such as may result from ,t,he conditions which 1 must exist to secure their safe custody* If there is one fact more than another with regard to crime that is undeniable; it is that the tendency to commit crimes against society is hereditary; hurtful propensities are transmitted from sire to son, just in the same way as scrofula, phthisis, and similar diseases are transmitted. But the criminal classes &r.e those who are also, from their mode of life, the most likely to contract those diseases which are so handed down, and consequently the physique of criminals is nearly always of a low type. On a recent visit to the gaol we were much struck with this fact. We believe that it would be impossible to select an equal number of men and women from the whole population of Dunedin who should present so many physical signs of intellectual,- moral, and bodily weakness as do the 120 unfortunates who are at present inmates of the prison. If then any attempts to. reform prisoners are to be successful, it would seem that one of th,e first requisites is that they should be placed in the most favorable position for •> improving and maintaining their physical stamina. The-mens Sana cannot be expected to exist without the corpus

mnum. The discipline of the gaol appears to be excellent; it is: mild but firm ; not unnecessarily repressive, but; sufficiently so. But that this desirable’ result lias been brought about is a perfect marvel. The prison seems to have been built for the express purpose of allowing the prisoners to conduct themselves just as they like when once ; they are locked up for the night—to make'all supervision impossible. Indeed it is a perfect 1 labyrinth. In the best Home prisons the governor’s quarters are in the. very middle : of 'the prisonall the corridors radiate from them' like the spokes of a cart-wheel; by means of this, simplei contrivance every prisoner is . virtually under the direct supervision of the governor at all times. : In our prison, on the contrary, everything appears to have been arranged in such. a way that the governor may be able to see as little as possible of what is going . on. Anything like a proper classification of prisoners, too, is almost an impossibility in the present what can be done in this way appears to be done, but that is very little. A stranger in the gaol finds it impossible to tell whether a prisoner is in for a short time, through having got into mischief by taking a glass too much j or if lie is a long-sentence man—unless he notice that the latter is cropped, and the former is not. Now we do think that this is unjust, especially when we consider that in very many cases the real crime for which the former is in gaol is simply impecuniosity, inability to pay 20s .or 40s. In “ society,” of course, the want of money is a very great crime, hut it does seem hard that a man should have to be treated as a felon, or that a woman should be made to lose any small portion of self-respect that she may have left, simply because he or she is not in a position to pay a fine. This leads usto ask question. , Is it not highly ' desirable that some other mode of deai--4 bag with drunkards than the one at

present in vogue should he found 1 ? Drunkenness stands on a very different footing from most other offences. A drunkard is not punished for the evil that he does, but Tor the evil that hA 'raiy do. A man may be unspeakably drunk in his own house, and the law not touch him. A man must be drunK in a public place, where he will be likely to injure others or to be injured himself, before the State will interfere with him. It is evident, therefore, that when he is punished for

drunkenness, the punishment is inflicted on him for evil that he might, could, would, of should do. The law, in short, undertakes to protect him when he cannot protect himself. Now, if the punishment inflicted for this offence had been,found to have a deterrent effect on drunkards, something might be said in its favor—it might be looked upon as a continuation of the protecting process ; but it cannot be doubted that in many cases the punishmfent inflicted for drunkenness has the effect of making men confirmed drunkards. After a man has once been in gaol he feels that he has no character to lose, and abandons himself , entirely to a bad habit which he might have Otherwise conquered. Our opinion is that the punishment for drunkenness should, for the first or second offence, be in every case a fine. If the offender is unable to pay the fine, the charge which the . State' makes for preventing him from injuring others, he might be looked after by the police till he had earned enough to discharge his liability. This is done virtually in the case of ordinary debtors, and might also answer in the case of debtors to the State.