THE inexperienced in jails would take for granted that the death of
Josephs gave Mr. Hawes's system a fatal check. No such thing. He
was staggered. So was Pharaoh staggered several times, yet he always
recovered himself in twenty-four hours. Hawes did not take so long as
that. A suicide was no novelty under his system. Six hours after he
found his victim dead he had a man and a boy crucified in the yard,
swore horribly at Fry, who, for the first time in his life, was behind
time, and tore out of his hands “Uncle Tom,” which was the topic that
had absorbed Fry and made him two minutes behind him; went home and
wrote a note to his friend Williams informing him of the suicide that
had taken place, and reflecting severely upon Josephs for his whole
conduct, with which this last offense against discipline was in strict
accordance. Then he had his grog, and having nothing to do he thought he
would see what was that story which had prevailed so far over the stern
realities of system as to derange that piece of clock work that went by
the name of Fry. He yawned over the first pages, but as the master hand
unrolled the great chromatic theory, he became absorbed, and devoured
this great human story till his candles burned down in their sockets and
sent him to bed four hours later than usual.
The next morning soon after chapel a gentleman's servant rode up to the
jail and delivered a letter for Mr. Hawes. It was from Justice Williams.
That worthy expressed in polysyllables his sorrow at the death of
Josephs after this fashion:
“A circumstance of this kind is always to be deplored, since it gives
occasion to the enemies of the system to cast reflections, which,
however unphilosophical and malignant, prejudice superficial judgments
against our salutary discipline.”
He then went on to say that the visiting justices would be at the jail
the next day at one o'clock to make their usual report, in which Mr.
Hawes might be sure his zeal and fidelity would not pass unnoticed. He
concluded by saying that Mr. Hawes must on that occasion present his
charges against the chaplain in a definite form, and proceedings would
be taken on the spot.
“Aha! aha! So I shall get rid of him. Confound him! he makes me harder
upon the beggars than I should be. Fry, put these numbers on the cranks
and bring me your report after dinner.”
With these words Mr. Hawes vanished, and to the infinite surprise of the
turnkeys was not seen in the jail for many hours. At two o'clock, as he
was still not in the prison, Fry went to his house. He found Mr. Hawes
deep in a book.
“Brought the report, sir.”
“Give it to me. Humph! No. 40 and 45 refractory at the crank. No. 65
caught getting up to his window; says he wanted to feel the light.
65--that is one of the boys, isn't it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How old is the young varmint?”
“Eleven, sir.”
“No. 14 heard to speak to a prisoner that was leaving the jail, his term
being out. What did he say to him?”
“Said 'Good-by! God bless you!'”
“I'll shut his mouth. Confound the beggars! how fond they are of
talking. I think they would rather go without their food than without
their jaw.
“No. 19 caught writing a story. It is that fellow Robinson, one of
the parson's men. I'll write something on his skin. How did he get the
things to write with?”
“Chaplain gave them him.”
“Ah! I am glad of that. You brought them away, of course?”
“Yes, sir; here they are. He made a terrible fuss about parting with
them.”
“What did he say?”
“He said Heaven was to judge between me and him.”
“Blaspheming dog! ---- him! I'll break him. What else?”
“'Get out of my sight,' said he, 'for fear I do you a mischief.' So then
down he pops on his knees in a corner and turns his back on me, like an
ignorant brute that he is.”
“Never mind, Fry, I'll break him.”
“I suppose we shall see you in the prison soon, shan't we, sir? The
place looks strange to me without you.”
“By-and-by--by-and-by. This confounded book sticks to me like a leech.
How far had you got when you lent it me?”
“Got just to the most interesting part,” said Fry dolefully, “where he
comes under a chap called Legree; and then you took it away.”
“Well, you'll have it again as soon as I have done with it. I say, what
do you think of this book? is it true do you think?”
“Oh! it is true--I'd take my oath of that.”
“Why how do you know?”
“Because it reads like true.”
“That is no rule, ye fool.”
“Well, sir, what do you think?”
This question staggered Hawes for a moment. However he assumed an
oracular look, and replied, “I think some of it is true and some isn't.”
“Do you think it is true about their knocking down blackee in one lot,
and his wife in another, and sending 'em a thousand miles apart?”
“Oh, that is true enough! I daresay.”
“And running them down with bloodhounds?”
“Why not; they look upon the poor devils as beasts. If you tell a Yankee
a nigger is a man he thinks you are poking fun at him.”
“It is a cursed shame!”
“Of course it is! but I'll tell you what I can't swallow in this book.
Hem! did you ever fall in with any Yankees?”
“One or two, sir.”
“Were they green at all?”
“That they weren't. They were rather foxy, I should say.”
“Rather. Why one of them would weather upon any three Englishmen that
ever were born. Now here is a book that as good as tells me it is a
Yankee custom to disable their beasts of burden. Gammon! they can't
afford to do it. I believe,” continued this candid personage (who had
never been in any of the States), “they are the cruelest set on the face
of the earth, but then they are the 'cutest (that is their own word),
and they are a precious sight too 'cute to disable the beast that
carries the grist to the mill.”
“Doesn't seem likely--now you put it to me.”
“Have a glass of grog, Fry.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“And there is the paper. Run your eye over it and don't speak to me for
ten minutes, for I must see how Tom gets on under this bloody-minded
heathen.”
Fry read the paper; but although he moistened it with a glass of grog,
he could not help casting envious glances from his folio at Mr. Hawes's
duodecimo.
Fibs mixed with truth charm us more than truth mixed with fibs.
Presently an oath escaped from Mr. Hawes.
“Sir!”
“Nothing, it is only this infernal--humph!”
Presently another expletive. “I'll tell you what it is, Fry, if somebody
doesn't knock this thundering Legree on the head, I'll put the book on
the fire.”
“Well, but if it isn't true, sir?”
“But it is true, every word of it, while you are reading it, ye fool.
What heathens there are in the world! First they sell a child out of his
mother's arms. She cuts sooner than be parted. They hunt her and come up
with her; but she knows what they are, and trusts her life and the child
to one of their great thundering frozen rivers as broad as the British
Channel sooner than fall into their hands. That is like a woman, Fry. A
fig for me being drowned if the kid is drowned with me; and I don't even
care so much for the kid being drowned if I go down with him--and the
cowardly vermin dogs and men stood barking on the bank and dursn't
follow a woman; but your cruel ones are always cowards. And now the rips
have got hold of this Tom. A chap with no great harm in him that I see,
except that he is a ---- sniveler and psalm-singer, and makes you sick
at times, but he isn't lazy; and now they are mauling him because he
couldn't do the work of two. A man can but do his best, black or white,
and it is infernal stupidity as well as cruelty to torment a fellow
because he can't do more than he can do. And all this because over
the same flesh and blood there is the sixteenth of an inch of skin a
different color. Wonder whether a white bear takes a black one for a
hog, or a red fox takes a blue one for a badger. Well, Fry, thank your
stars that you were born in Britain. There are no slaves here, and no
buying and selling of human flesh; and one law for high and low, rich
and poor, and justice for the weak as well as the strong.”
“Yes, sir,” said Fry deferentially--“are you coming into the jail, sir?”
“No,” replied Hawes sturdily, “I won't move till I see what becomes of
the negro, and what is done to this eternal ruffian.”
“But about the prisoners in my report, sir,” remonstrated Fry.
“Oh, you can see to that without my coming,” replied Hawes with
nonchalance. “Put 40 and 45 in the jacket four hours apiece. Mind
there's somebody by with the bucket against they sham.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Put the boy on bread and water--and to-morrow I'll ask the justices to
let me flog him. No. 14--humph! stop his supper--and his bed--and gas.”
“And Robinson?”
“Oh, give him no supper at all--and no breakfast--not even bread and
water, d'ye hear. And at noon I'll put him with his empty belly in the
black-hole--that will cow him down to the ground--there, be off!”
Next morning Mr. Hawes sat down to breakfast in high spirits. This very
day he was sure to humiliate his adversary, most likely get rid of him
altogether.
Mr. Eden, on the contrary, wore a somber air. Hawes noticed it, mistook
it, and pointed it out to Fry. “He is down upon his luck; he knows he is
coming to an end.”
After breakfast Mr. Eden went into Robinson's cell. He found him
haggard. “Oh, I am glad you are come, sir; they are starving me! No
supper last night, no breakfast this morning, and all for--hum.”
“For what?”
“Well, sir, then--having paper in my cell, and for writing--doing what
you bade me--writing my life.”
Mr. Eden colored and winced. The cruelty and the personal insult
combined almost took away his breath for a moment. “Heaven grant me
patience a little longer,” said he aloud. Then he ran out of the cell,
and returned in less than a minute with a great hunch of bread and a
slice of ham. “Eat this,” said he, all fluttering with pity.
The famished man ate like a wolf; but in the middle he did stop to say,
“Did one man ever save another so often as you have me! Now my belly is
full I shall have strength to stand the jacket, or whatever is to come
next.”
“But you are not to be tormented further than this, I hope?”
“Ah, sir!” replied Robinson, “you don't know the scoundrel yet. He
is not starving me for nothing. This is to weaken me till he puts the
weight on that is to crush me.”
“I hope you exaggerate his personal dislike to you and your own
importance--we all do that.”
“Well,” sighed Robinson, “I hope I do. Any way now my belly is full I
have got a chance with him.”
The visiting justices met in the jail. The first to arrive was Mr.
Woodcock. In fact he came at eleven o'clock, an hour before the others.
Had Mr. Hawes expected him so soon, he would have taken Carter down, who
was the pilloried one this morning; but he was equal to the emergency.
He met Mr. Woodcock with a depressed manner, as of a tender but wise
father, who in punishing his offspring had punished himself, and said
in a low, regretful voice, “I am sorry to say I have been compelled to
punish a prisoner very severely.”
“What is his offense?”
“Being refractory and breaking his crank. You will find him in the
labor-yard. He was so violent we were obliged to put him in the jacket.”
“I shall see him. The labor-yard is the first place I go to.”
Mr. Hawes knew that, Mr. Woodcock.
The justice found Carter in that state of pitiable torture, the sight
of which made Mr. Eden very ill. He went up to him and said, “My poor
fellow, I am very sorry for you; but discipline must be maintained, and
you are now suffering for fighting against it. Make your submission to
the governor, and then I dare say he will shorten your punishment as far
as he thinks consistent with his duty.”
Carter, it may well be imagined, made no answer. It is doubtful
whether the worthy magistrate expected or required one. An occasion
for misjudging a self-evident case of cruelty had arrived. This worthy
seized the opportunity, received an ex-parte statement for Gospel, and
misjudged, spite of his senses.
Item. An occasion for twaddling had come, and this good soul seized it
and twaddled into a man's ear who was fainting on the rack.
At this moment the more observant Hawes saw the signs of shamming coming
on. So he said hastily, “Oh, he will come to soon, and then he will be
taken down;” and moved away. Mr. Woodcock followed him without one grain
of suspicion or misgiving.
The English State has had many opportunities of gauging the average
intellects of its unpaid jurists. By these it has profited so well that
it intrusts blindly to this gentleman and his brethren the following
commission:--
They are to come into a place of darkness and mystery, a place locked
up; a place which, by the folly of the nation and the shallow egotists
who are its placemen and are called its statesmen, is not subject to
the only safeguard of law and morals--daily inspection by the great
unprejudiced public. They are to come into this, the one pitch-dark hole
that is now left in the land. They are to come here once in two months,
and at this visit to see all that has been done there in the dark since
their last visit. Their eagle eye is not to be hoodwinked by appearances
got up to meet their visit. They are to come and comprehend with one
piercing glance the past months as well as the present hour. Good. Only
for this task is required, not the gullibility that characterizes the
many, but the sagacity that distinguishes the few.
Mr. Woodcock undertook not to be deceived as to what had been done in
the jail while he was forty miles distant--and Hawes gulled him under
his own eyes.
What different men there are in the world, and how differently are the
same things seen by them! The first crucifixion Eden saw he turned as
sick as a dog--the first crucifixion Woodcock saw he twaddled in
the crucified's ear, left him on the cross, and went on his way well
pleased.
Hawes, finding what sort of a man he had to deal with, thought within
himself, “Why should I compromise discipline in any point?” He said to
Mr. Woodcock, “There is another prisoner whom I am afraid I must give an
hour in the dark cell.”
“What has he been doing?”
“Scribbling a lot of lies upon some paper he got from the chaplain.”
Mr. Hawes's brief and unkind definition of autobiography did Robinson's
business. Mr. Woodcock simply observed that the proposed punishment was
by no means a severe one for the offense.
They visited several cells. Woodcock addressed the prisoners in certain
words, accompanied with certain tones and looks, that were at least as
significant as his words, and struck the prisoners as more sincere.
The words.
“If you have anything to complain of here, now is the time to say so,
and your complaint shall be sifted.”
The tones and looks.
“I know you are better off here than such scum as you deserve, but you
have a right to contradict me if you like; only mind, if you don't prove
it to my satisfaction, who am not the man to believe anything you say,
you had better have held your tongue.”
Meantime Mr. Hawes said nothing, but fixed his eye on the rogue, and
that eye said, “One word of discontent and the moment he is gone I
massacre you.” Then followed in every case the old theatrical business
according to each rogue's measure of ability. They were in the Elysian
fields; one thing alone saddened them; some day or other they must
return to the world.
Fathers, sent by your apprehensive wives to see whether Dicky is well
used at that school or not, don't draw Dicky into a corner of the
playground, and with tender kisses and promises of inviolable secrecy
coax him to open his little heart to you, and tell you whether he is
really happy; leave such folly to women--it is a weakness to wriggle
into the truth as they do.
No! you go like a man into the parlor with the schoolmaster--then have
Dicky in--let him see the two authorities together on good terms--then
ask him whether he is happy and comfortable and well used. He will tell
you he is. Go home rejoicing--but before you go into the drawing-room do
pray spend twenty minutes by the kitchen fire, and then go upstairs to
the boy's mother--and let her eat you, for you belong to the family of
the Woodcocks.
“We are passing one cell.”
“Oh! that one is empty,” replied Hawes.
Not quite empty; there was a beech coffin standing in that cell, and the
corpse of a murdered thief lay waiting for it.
At twelve o'clock the justices were all assembled in their room. “We
will send you a message in half an hour, Mr. Hawes.”
Mr. Hawes bowed and retired, and bade Fry to take Robinson to the dark
cell. The poor fellow knew resistance was useless. He came out at the
word of command, despair written on his face. Of all the horrors of this
hell the dark cell was the one he most dreaded. He looked up to Hawes
to see if anything he could say would soften him. No! that hardened face
showed neither pity nor intelligence; as well appeal to a stone statue
of a mule.
At this moment Mr. Eden came into the jail. Robinson met him on the
ground-floor, and cried out to him, “Sir, they are sending me to the
black hole for it. I am a doomed man; the black hole for six hours.”
“No!” roared Hawes from above, “for twelve hours; the odd six is for
speaking in prison.” Robinson groaned.
“I will take you out in three,” said Mr. Eden calmly. Hawes heard and
laughed aloud.
“Give me your hand on that, sir, for pity's sake,” cried Robinson. Mr.
Eden gave him his hand and said, firmly, “I will take you out in two
hours, please God.”
Hawes chuckled. “Parson is putting his foot in it more and more. The
justices shall know this.”
This momentary contact with his good angel gave Robinson one little ray
of hope for a companion in the cave of darkness, madness, and death.