inuance, and the stupid indifference of society at
large in permitting it. The handkerchief performance seemed a fair example
of the unreasoning, futile, incredible imbecility of the whole theory and
practice.

The mention of the handkerchief reminds me of one of Number Four's early
remarks.

"Hey, Tom, did you know a fellow committed suicide in your cell once?"

"No, did he?" I reply, feigning ignorance and yawning. "Well, I hope his
ghost won't come around to-night! There isn't room for two in this cell."
At which frivolous remark they laugh. But in spite of my answer I do not
feel in the least like laughing myself. The thought that I am locked into
the very cell which was the scene of the tragedy of that poor human soul,
whom a little decent treatment and kindly sympathy might perhaps have
saved, only adds fuel to the flame of my wrath.

Before proceeding it may be well to give a brief account of my
fellow-sufferers, as I became acquainted with them through the night or
learned about them afterward. And let me begin by saying that I had fully
expected that now at last I was to meet the worst that humanity has to
show. While I had come to prison strongly inclined to disbelieve in the
existence of a criminal class, as distinct from the rest of mankind, yet I
had come with an open mind, ready to receive the facts as I found them,
and duly readjust my previous opinions. I was entirely prepared to
encounter many depraved and hardened men, but so far I had met none whom I
thought hopelessly bad--quite the contrary. I had been put to work with
the "toughest bunch of fellows in the prison"; and I had found myself side
by side with Harley Stuhlmiller, and Jack Bell, and Blackie Laflam, and
Patsy Mooney--the genial "baseball shark," and the "dime-novel Kid," who
wanted to give me his grapes; to say nothing of that best of
partners--Jack Murphy.

But surely in the jail, so I reasoned, I shall meet the "confirmed
criminal." In this prison are fourteen hundred convicts--men who, under
the law, have been found guilty of robbery, arson, forgery, murder--all
kinds of crime; men condemned to live apart from the rest of mankind, to
be caged within walls. And now in the jail--in this place of punishment of
last resort--here where the refuse of the System is gathered, I must
certainly come in contact with the vilest and most hopeless. Men who will
submit to no law, no control--men without faith in God or man--men who
even in prison