370 The Condemned Cell. Oct. 
At the period of my visit to this place, for some reason—perhaps on 
account of the number of criminals then under sentence of immediate 
execution—they were not confined in the cells commonly allotted for 
such purposes, but were all placed together in a long chamber, on what 
might be called the first floor of the building. A staircase of stoné Jéd 
to it, and as the edifice stood: within a court-yard, the entrance to which 
was secured. by several gates and passages, it had not been thought 
necessary to fasten the door of the room. It was a long whitewashed 
chamber, lighted by small windows, which were secured with thick iron 
bars. At one end lay the mattresses and bedding of the inmates, 
rolled up in as small a compass as possible, to be out of the way: a 
small wooden desk, furnished with materials for writing, stood near 
them. At the other end of the chamber there was a chimney, in which 
a fire, as dull as the weather, was consuming. A long deal table, with 
benches on each side, stood in the middle of the room; and on the right 
hand was a large leaden sink, furnished with water for the use of the 
prisoners. Every thing was kept scrupulously clean ; but, at the same 
time, so bare and desolate an appearance prevailed throughout the 
room, that if all the other circumstances of horror had been absent, 
there was enough in the mere look of the place to make one’s blood 
run cold. But the people—the human beings of whom this was for a 
‘time the abiding place—they formed a sight the most revolting, and 
which words can hardly describe. ti 
On a seat near the fire sate a miserable looking old man, dressed in a 
loose brown great-coat, and wearinga white night-cap. He was reading, 
or rather spelling, a hymn, from a book which had been given him by 
one of the dissenting clergymen, who are always about the. prisons. 
The utter want of expression in this poor wretch’s countenance, and 
the almost idiotic manner in which he continued to mutter, half aloud, 
_words which he did not understand, excited feelings of greater pain 
ot ap there was something of disgust mixed up with them) than’ a 
display of violent grief. This man had been a small farmer, and was 
possessed of some substance; he had long been suspected in his ‘ 
neighbourhood of dishonest practices, and at length being convicted of 
sheep-stealing, the general circumstances of his life prevented his being 
‘treated as many others who had been found guilty of the same offence. 
The apathy which he displayed formed a sickening contrast to the scene 
around him :—the helpless wretch, with less intelligence than a beast des- 
tined to be slaughtered, was awaiting his fate with as little apprehension. 
On the opposite side of the reom three men, each of whom was 
heavily ironed, were walking up and down in a row. At every step 
their fetters rung against each other, and the regularity of their paces 
produced a dull horrible sound, monotonous and sad as the groans 
which may be imagined to proceed from the prison caverns of the 
damned, The first of these persons was a pale, slender youth ; who, with 
the second—an elder and more robust man on the other side,—had been 
condemned for a burglary. The third man, who occupied the middle place, 
was a Jew, of sturdy limbs and short. stature. He had been found guilty of 
a.street-robbery, and as he had_ maltreated his victim after plundering 
_ him, he-was doomed to a fate, which but for the cruelty he had practised, 
he would probably have escaped. . After his condemnation he had_ 
suffered his beard to grow—a practice which it seems is. common with 
the Jews—and the grizzled black hair of several days’ grow 1, which 
now overspread all the lower part of his face, added to the naturally 
