182 Soczal Science Congress. 
which visitations may be also multiplied and increased in 
severity in the earlier stages. To these earlier stages the 
prisoner is to be sent back in cases ef misconduct, and then 
left to work himself up again. Although, as I have shown, 
when the prisoner is shut out from all but the mere possi- 
bility of regaining his liberty, the means of inspiring him 
with hope are reduced to narrow limits, yet it must not be 
forgotten that some facilities for appropriate treatment of 
prisoners for life, arise out of the very absence of all neces- 
sity for so training the convict in prison as to endow him 
(when that is possible), with sucha capacity for self-govern- 
ment as shall enable him to maintain a self-supporiing 
position on his return to society. When such a return is 
to be provided for, it is found essential to success that it 
should be kept in view from a very early stage of the 
punishment. No fair opportunity must be lost of giving 
the convict some power over his own actions, beginning 
with very slight relaxations of control, but approaching by 
the time of his discharge to a state differing comparatively 
little from that which he will enjoy when he finds himself 
on the outside of the prison gates, with his ticket-of-leave 
in his hand. As regards prisoners for life, however, relaxa- 
tions from strict and minute control need not begin until a 
later period, and should never extend so far as to place the 
criminal in a position similar to that which Sir Walter 
Crofton calls his “intermediate stage” in penal servitude. 
On the other hand, as it is not essential that he should form 
such habits of industry as will enable him to hold his place 
in the struggle undergone by a free labourer, indulgence 
may, after a term of years, be afforded by a diminution of 
his hours of toil. I scarcely need say that care must be 
taken to make all prisoners for life not only acquainted 
with the rules by which, if they persevere in industry and 
good conduct, they will gradually mitigate for themselves 
the hardships of their lot, but they must also be enabled 
to see that such of their fellow-convicts as have earned the 
indulgences to which I have referred are in the full enjoy- 
ment of them. As to the second class of prisoners for life 
—viz., incorrigible offenders against the rights of property, 
they ought not, I think, to be subjected to the hardship 
and degradation of irons, but in all other respects I would 
recommend that the differences of treatment between them 
and the prisoners of the first class should be but slight. | 
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