feeble ray of hope
has fled for ever, and whose miserable career will shortly terminate in a
violent and shameful death. Contact with death even in its least
terrible shape, is solemn and appalling. How much more awful is it to
reflect on this near vicinity to the dying--to men in full health and
vigour, in the flower of youth or the prime of life, with all their
faculties and perceptions as acute and perfect as your own; but dying,
nevertheless--dying as surely--with the hand of death imprinted upon them
as indelibly--as if mortal disease had wasted their frames to shadows,
and corruption had already begun!

It was with some such thoughts as these that we determined, not many
weeks since, to visit the interior of Newgate--in an amateur capacity, of
course; and, having carried our intention into effect, we proceed to lay
its results before our readers, in the hope--founded more upon the nature
of the subject, than on any presumptuous confidence in our own
descriptive powers--that this paper may not be found wholly devoid of
interest. We have only to premise, that we do not intend to fatigue the
reader with any statistical accounts of the prison; they will be found at
length in numerous reports of numerous committees, and a variety of
authorities of equal weight. We took no notes, made no memoranda,
measured none of the yards, ascertained the exact number of inches in no
particular room: are unable even to report of how many apartments the
gaol is composed.

We saw the prison, and saw the prisoners; and what we did see, and what
we thought, we will tell at once in our own way.

Having delivered our credentials to the servant who answered our knock at
the door of the governor's house, we were ushered into the 'office;' a
little room, on the right-hand side as you enter, with two windows
looking into the Old Bailey: fitted up like an ordinary attorney's
office, or merchant's counting-house, with the usual fixtures--a
wainscoted partition, a shelf or two, a desk, a couple of stools, a pair
of clerks, an almanack, a clock, and a few maps. After a little delay,
occasioned by sending into the interior of the prison for the officer
whose duty it was to conduct us, that functionary arrived; a
respectable-looking man of about two or three and fifty, in a
broad-brimmed hat, and full suit of black, who, but for his keys, would
have looked quite as much like a clergyman as a turnkey. We were
disappointed; he had not even to