418 



Monthly Review of Literature. 



[OCT. 



charged with such a crimo there is but little in- 

 ducement to avoid trial, and certainly not enough 

 to jilstify a refusal of good securities for his ap- 

 pearance. There are also instances where the cha- 

 racter of the accused, the ties of his station, the 

 character of his sureties, might counterbalance the 

 weight of evidence against him. As the law before 

 stood, these circumstances were allowed to ope- 

 rate ; and it would have been more in the true 

 spirit of our constitution to have increased the 

 liberty of the subject, even at a small hazard of the 

 public security, than thus to multiply the number 

 of commitments before trial, merely on the ground 

 of a supposed necessity. By admitting more libe- 

 rally to bail, the injury tn the individual is cer- 

 tainly avoided, and the public security but slightly 

 hazarded ; but by limiting the privilege, as it has 

 recently been limited, much certain evil to the 

 party is inflicted, while the public advantage is but 

 contingent, and in many cases not in any degree 

 endangered. 



We must quote a few lines more: 



The situation of the poor, in respect to bail, is 

 particularly entitled to consideration. If a me- 

 chanic or day labourer be accused, perhaps justly, 

 of a petty offence, he is required to give twenty-four 

 hours' notice of bail. During this time he is im- 

 prisoned, and if after all he fail to obtain the secu- 

 rity of a housekeeper an object not very easy for 

 a man in the humblest walks of life to accomplish 

 he is fully committed, undergoes the restraint, 

 and is exposed to the corruption of a gaol, and on 

 his trial he may be fined a. few shillings and dis- 

 charged. The duration of this person's confine- 

 ment is perhaps three times longer than that to 

 which a judge would sentence him ; and he may 

 be fined a sum comparatively small, but which to 

 a man in his circumstances may amount to asevere 

 penalty. And what is the result? He has suffered 

 essentially in character, and lost his previous oc- 

 cupation ; while his wife and children have been 

 driv n to the workhouse, &c. Personal bail might 

 be taken in many instances, where the inducement 

 to break it is not strong, and where flight would 

 certainly incur the loss of character and employ- 

 ment, and the ruin of a family. 



Another measure likely to reduce, not 

 the number of criminals, but the num- 

 ber of prisoners at one time and it is the 

 real numbers that make the management 

 of prisoners so difficult is more frequent 

 gaol deliveries or at least at more equal 

 intervals. At present, except in the Home 

 Circuit, and the Old Bailey, gaol deliveries 

 occur twice a year. But the difference, 

 in the point \ve are looking' to, is very 

 great between the assizes being held ac- 

 curately every six -months, and as now 

 they are held, alternately at eight and 

 four months. In the home circuit, they 

 are held at equal intervals of four months, 

 and the advantage there is obvious suffi- 

 ciently so, surely, now to extend a third 

 assize through the whole country. Here 

 we have said nothing of the cruelty to the 

 prisoner ; but that is a matter not to be 

 overlooked. A person may now be im- 

 prisoned nine months before trial, and 

 sometimes more. The report speaks of a 



boy committed on 1 1th August, 1823, and 

 tried 12th August, 1824 (how he came 

 not to be tried at the Lent assizes does 

 not appear), and this for taking a hat in 

 the street from another boy, probably in 

 sport, and finally acquitted. What was 

 done for this injured lad? Was no com- 

 pensation made him no after-care taken 

 of him ? None whatever ; his ruin was 

 completed by his residence in the prison ; 

 he was flung at the end of a twelve- 

 month on the wide world, and has since, 

 as might be expected, been transported 

 for life. 



The effects also of the degrading system 

 of paying agricultural labourers out of the 

 poor-rates, in depressing the condition 

 and character of the poor, and driving 

 them to crime, are dwelt upon with great 

 force and feeling ; we have no space, or 

 we would quote the passage. The same 

 we may say of the effects of the game- 

 laws. 1,700 a year for the last seven 

 years have been committed for poaching ; 

 and generally one-fourth of those who fill 

 the county gaols are poachers. The ef- 

 fects of the revenue-laws, also, in gene- 

 rating smugglers, we have before alluded 

 to, but cannot afford room to supply what 

 is plainly a defect in the report. Neither 

 are we able to give an adequate impres- 

 sion conveyed to our own minds by the 

 forcible statement of the defects of our 

 debtor prisons the King's Bench and the 

 Fleet. 



The report next turns to the prisons of 

 our Colonies, which are abominable be- 

 yond al! belief. Very interesting accounts 

 also will be found of the gaols in the dif- 

 ferent countries of Europe. In the review 

 of Switzerland, a case of torture in the 

 prison of Fribourg is stated ; the com- 

 mittee very justly remark upon it, "that 

 this practice of torture, in a country like 

 Switzerland, is one of the most striking 

 proofs that was ever exhibited of the 

 despotic power of habit of the blind ad- 

 herence of man to the practice of his an- 

 cestors, and of his clinging to their exam- 

 ple long after the injustice and impolicy 

 of this attachment have been clearly un- 

 folded, and universally acknowledged. 1 ' 

 An instance is also quoted as having oc- 

 curred at Minden, in Westphalia and ne 

 of the most horrible to the imagination 

 we ever heard of. The object of ven- 

 geance was not a capital offender, but a 

 person, who, from conscientious motives, 

 peculiar to the religious body of which he 

 was a member, had refused to serve in the 

 militia. He was placed in a cell, the floor 

 and sides of which were closely studded 

 with projecting spikes, or pieces of sharp- 

 ened iron resembling the blades of knives. 

 The individual remained in this state for 

 twenty-four hours, and the punishment 

 was repeated at three distinct intervals. 



