TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 103 



than that of the army and nary, but is very unsatisfactory. The aim in the feed- 

 ing of this class is to maintaui health and strength on the least quantity of food, 

 and on the food the least palatable ; and some would even risk the health and 

 strength for a certain limited time in order to add more effectually to the punish- 

 ment of the prisoner. At the same time the conditions amder which the prisoners 

 are found are most various, both as regards the personal ones of age, sex, health, 

 state of constitution, sensibility, and previous habits, and the peiial ones of diu-a- 

 tion of imprisonment, closeness of confinement, eniplojouent, and labour. Here 

 then we have a combination of circumstances demaudiug all the Iniowledge which 

 both science and practice can afford for their proper combination, estimation, and 

 application to dietary purposes, many (perhaps all) of which may be so estimated 

 and combined that several well-defined classes may be arranged, and food provided 

 which shall be so adapted to each, tliat prisoners, however variously employed, 

 may be fed with equal sufficiency. Can we conceive a case in which the value of 

 a public officer, thoroughly acquainted "wdth the subject, would be so great as this, 

 or one in which the conditions under which exact knowledge can be gained would 

 be so perfect? But uo such officer exists in connexion with, this or any other 

 department of the Government, and there is no official person to whom the Govern- 

 ment may tm-n for advice, except the medical officers of each separate prison, or an 

 inspector of prisons, who may or may not be a medical man, and who, as a medical 

 man, may or may not be an authority on this question among his medical and 

 scientific compeers. It seems almost past belief that in so great a country, with 

 so enlightened a state of public opiniou, and with so gi-eat a mass of persons who 

 are fed under the direct or indirect supervision of the Government, there should 

 not be a place for an officer possessed of this special and abstruse Icnowledge. 



Convict prisons are so far distinct from comity prisons that they are under the 

 direct control of the Government, and for every detail in their management the 

 Government is responsible. Yet even here, with all the advantages of a central 

 and common authority, the state of the dietary question is very unsatisfactory. 

 The time has gone by when death, or even extensive and important disease, can 

 occm* as the result of the want of food ; but one need not to have far advanced in 

 life to be able to remember the prevalence of scurvy in convict establishments, 

 and the great defect of sanitary rules. Since that period attempts of a convulsive 

 nature have been made to more exactly fit the dietary to the requirements of the 

 convicts, so that, on the discovery of evils from delfect of food, a large increase in 

 the dietary was made, and, this having attracted attention, in a similar convidsive 

 manner a gi-eat diminution of food was ordered. Gn the opening of the Portland 

 prison in November 1848, a diet was ordered- which was in excess of that of fi'ee 

 working men ; but in a few months aftei-wards, on the complaint of some of the 

 prisoners that they were insufficiently fed,;a considerable increase in the quantity of 

 meat was made, and in the year following the dietary was again further increased. 

 There have been of late almost incessant complaints on the part of the public 

 that the dietary in use in this aud other convict jails was excessive, because it 

 was better than the diet of free working men, and particularly that so large a 

 quantity as 36 to 40 ozs. of cooked meat (equal to 48 or 54 ozs. of imcooked meat) 

 was supplied weekly ; and although prison officials, for the most part, have been 

 of opinion that the dietaiy was not in excess, another chauge has just been made, 

 by which no less than about one day's food in seven has been withdrawn from the 

 convicts employed on public works. Consider for a moment the vast importance 

 of the question which is thus made to oscillate from one extreme to the other. 

 If the convicts are too well fed, the evil of waste of food is caused, with its conse- 

 quent burden to the hard-working and honest community, in addition to its evil 

 influence upon the mind of the convict in preventing the due appreciation of his 

 punishment and the recurrence of crime, and the origin of reasonable complaints 

 on the paii; of honest and hard-working men, and the temptation to the imstable to 

 fall into crime. On the other hand, if the quantity of food allowed be not excessive, 

 how great the responsibility of those who lessen it, and how great the crime even 

 of those who, by thiis lessening it, offer something like a reasonable groimd for 

 mutinous conduct on the part of the sufferers ! AVhat can afford gi-eater grounds 

 for the request, on the part of the public, that the highest scientific knowledge 



