a, who took the greatest interest in the benevolent
enterprise. From some letters given in the _Memoirs of Mrs. Fry_ it
seems that the Empress felt a true Womanly compassion for the inmates of
the Government Lunatic Asylum, and inaugurated a system of more rational
treatment. How far her influence on behalf of the imprisoned and insane
was induced and fostered by the English Quakeress, was never fully known
until after her death, when a most interesting letter, addressed to the
children of Mrs. Fry, was published. This letter was sent to them by Mr.
John Venning, brother to Walter Venning, who had opened the
correspondence, but who had, like the benevolent lady with whom it was
maintained, "passed over to the majority." From this correspondence it
was found that the Emperor and Empress of Russia, the Princess Sophia
Mestchersky, Prince Galitzin, and many ladies of high rank, had been
stirred up to befriend those who had fallen under the strong arm of the
law, and to make their captivity more productive, if possible, of good
results.

Not only so, but lunatics, more helpless than prisoners, had been cared
for, as the outcome of Mrs. Fry's visits to St. Petersburg, and her
communications with the powers that were at that era. With these
preliminary words of explanation, the subjoined letter speaks for
itself:--

I cheerfully comply with your desire to be furnished with some of
the most striking and useful points contained in your late beloved
mother's correspondence with myself in Russia, relative to the
improvement of the Lunatic Asylum in St. Petersburg. I the more
readily engage in this duty, because I am persuaded that its
publication may, under the Lord's blessing, prove of great service
to many such institutions on the Continent, as well as in Great
Britain.... I begin by stating that her correspondence was
invaluable, as regarded the treatment and management of both
prisoners and insane people. It was the fruit of her own rich
practical experience communicated with touching simplicity, and it
produced lasting benefits to these institutions in Russia. In 1827,
I informed your dear mother that I had presented to the Emperor
Nicholas a statement of the defects of the Government Lunatic
Asylum, which could only be compared to our own old Bedlam in
London, fifty years since; and that the dowager Empress had sent
for me to the Winter P