_In Stir._
I hung my head with shame, but not because of contrition. I was ashamed
of being caught and made a spectacle of. All the way to Sing Sing
station people stared at us as if we were wild animals. We walked from
the town to the prison, in close company with two deputy sheriffs. I
observed considerably, knowing that I should not see the outside world
again for a number of years. I looked with envy at the people we passed
who seemed honest, and thought of home and the chances I had thrown
away.
When I reached the stir I was put through the usual ceremonies. My
pedigree was taken, but I told the examiners nothing. I gave them a
false name and a false pedigree. Then a bath was given to my clothes
and I was taken to the tailor shop. When my hair had been cropped close
and a suit of stripes given me I felt what it was to be the convicted
criminal. It was not a pleasant feeling, I can tell you, and when I was
taken to my cell my heart sank indeed. A narrow room, seven feet, four
inches long; dark, damp, with moisture on the walls, and an old iron
cot with plenty of company, as I afterwards discovered--this was to be
my home for years. And I as full of life as a young goat! How could I
bear it?
After I had been examined by the doctor and questioned about my
religion by the chaplain, I was left to reflect in my cell. I was
interrupted in my melancholy train of thought by two convicts who
were at work in the hall just outside my cell. I had known them on
the outside, and they, taking good care not to be seen by the screws
(keepers) tipped me off through my prison door to everything in stir
which was necessary for a first timer to know. They told me to keep
my mouth shut, to take everything from the screws in silence, and if
assigned to a shop to do my work. They told me who the stool-pigeons
were, that is to say, the convicts who, in order to curry favor and
have an easy time, put the keepers next to what other convicts are
doing, and so help to prevent escapes. They tipped me off to those
keepers who were hard to get along with, and put me next to the
Underground Tunnel, and who were running it. Sing Sing, they said, is
the best of the three New York penitentiaries: for the grub is better
than at the others, there are more privileges, and, above all, it is
nearer New York, so that your friends can visit you more frequently.
They gave me a good deal of prison gossip, and told me who among my
friends were there, and what their condition of health was. So and so
had died or gone home, they said, such and such had been drafted to
Auburn or Clinton prisons. If I wanted to communicate with my friends
in stir all that was necessary for me to do was to write a few stiffs
(letters) and they would be sent by the Underground Tunnel. They asked
me about their old pals, hang-outs and girls in New York, and I, in
turn gave them a lot of New York gossip. Like all convicts they shed a
part of the things they had received from home, gave me canned goods,
tobacco and a pipe. It did not take me long to get on to the workings
of the prison.
I was particularly interested in the Underground Tunnel, for I saw
at once its great usefulness. This is the secret system by which
contraband articles, such as whiskey, opium and morphine are brought
into the prison. When a rogue is persuasive with the coin of the realm
he can always find a keeper or two to bring him what he considers
the necessaries of life, among which are opium, whiskey and tobacco.
If you have a screw "right," you can be well supplied with these
little things. To get him "right" it is often necessary to give him a
share--about twenty per cent--of the money sent you from home. This
system is worked in all the State prisons in New York, and during
my first term, or any of the other terms for that matter, I had no
difficulty in supplying my growing need for opium.
I do not want people to get the idea that it is always necessary to
bribe a keeper, in order to obtain these little luxuries; for many a
screw has brought me whiskey and hop, and contraband letters from other
inmates, without demanding a penny. A keeper is a human being like the
rest of us, and he is sometimes moved by considerations other than of
pelf. No matter how good and conscientious he may be, a keeper is but
a man after all, and, having very little to do, especially if he is in
charge of an idle gang of "cons" he is apt to enter into conversation
with them, particularly if they are better educated or more interesting
than he, which often is the case. They tell him about their escapades
on the outside and often get his sympathy and friendship. It is
only natural that those keepers who are good fellows should do small
favors for certain convicts. They may begin by bringing the convicts
newspapers to read, but they will end by providing them with almost
everything. Some of them, however, are so lacking in human sympathy,
that their kindness is aroused only by a glimpse of the coin of the
realm; or by the prospect of getting some convict to do their dirty
work for them, that is, to spy upon their fellow prisoners.
At Auburn penitentiary, whither I was drafted after nine months at
Sing Sing, a few of the convicts peddled opium and whiskey, with, of
course, the connivance of the keepers. There are always some persons in
prison as well as out who want to make capital out of the misfortunes
of others. These peddlars, were despised by the rest of the convicts,
for they were invariably stool-pigeons; and young convicts who never
before knew the power of the drug became opium fiends, all on account
of the business propensities of these detestable rats (stool-pigeons)
who, because they had money and kept the screws next to those cons who
tried to escape, lived in Easy Street while in stir.
While on this subject, I will tell about a certain famous "fence"
(at one of these prisons) although he did not operate until my second
term. At that time things were booming on the outside. The graft was so
good that certain convicts in my clique were getting good dough sent
them by their pals who were at liberty; and many luxuries came in,
therefore, by the Underground Tunnel. Now those keepers who are next
to the Underground develop, through their association with convicts, a
propensity to graft, but usually have not the nerve to hustle for the
goods. So they are willing to accept stolen property, not having the
courage and skill to steal, from the inhabitants of the under world.
A convict, whom I knew when at liberty, named Mike, thought he saw
an opportunity to do a good "fencing" business in prison. He gave a
"red-front" (gold watch and chain), which he had stolen in his good
days, to a certain keeper who was running the Underground, and thus
got him "right." Then Mike made arrangements with two grafters on the
outside to supply the keeper and his friends with what they wanted. If
the keeper said his girl wanted a stone, Mike would send word to one
of the thieves on the outside to supply a good diamond as quickly as
possible. The keeper would give Mike a fair price for these valuable
articles and then sell the stones or watches, or make his girl a
present.
Other keepers followed suit, for they couldn't see how there was any
"come-back" possible, and soon Mike was doing a thriving business. It
lasted for five or six months, when Mike stopped it as a regular graft
because of the growing cupidity of the keepers. One of them ordered
a woman's watch and chain and a pair of diamond ear-rings through the
Underground Tunnel. Mike obtained the required articles, but the keeper
paid only half of what he promised, and Mike thereupon shut up shop.
Occasionally, however, he continued to sell goods stolen by his pals
who were at liberty, but only for cash on the spot, and refused all
credit. The keepers gradually got a great feeling of respect for this
convict "fence" who was so clever and who stood up for his rights; and
the business went on smoothly again, for a while.
But finally it was broken up for good. A grafter on the outside, Tommy,
sent through the Underground a pawn ticket for some valuable goods,
among them a sealskin sacque worth three hundred dollars, which he
had stolen and hocked in Philadelphia. Mike sold the pawn-ticket to
a screw. Soon after that Tommy, or one of his pals, got a fall and
"squealed". The police got "next" to where the goods were, and when
the keeper sent the ticket and the money to redeem the articles they
allowed them to be forwarded to the prison, but arrested the keeper for
receiving stolen goods. He was convicted and sentenced to ten years,
but got off through influence. That, however, finished the "fence" at
the institution.
To resume the thread of my narrative, the day after I reached Sing Sing
I was put through the routine that lasted all the time I was there. At
six-thirty in the morning we were awakened by the bell and marched in
lock-step (from which many of us were to acquire a peculiar gait that
was to mark us through life and help prevent us from leading decent
lives) to the bucket-shop, where we washed, marched to the mess for
breakfast at seven-thirty, then to the various shops to work until
eleven-thirty, when at the whistle we would form again into squads
and march, again in the lock-step, fraternally but silently, to our
solemn dinner, which we ate in dead silence. Silence, indeed, except
on the sly, was the general rule of our day, until work was over, when
we could whisper together until five o'clock, the hour to return to
our cells, into which we would carry bread for supper, coffee being
conveyed to us through a spout in the wall. The food at Sing Sing was
pretty good. Breakfast consisted of hash or molasses, black coffee and
bread; and at dinner we had pork and beans, potatoes, hot coffee and
bread. Pork and beans gave place to four eggs on Friday, and sometimes
stews were given us. It was true what I'd heard, that Sing Sing has the
best food of any institution I have known. After five o'clock I would
read in my cell by an oil lamp (since my time electricity has been put
in the prison) until nine o'clock, when I had to put out my light and
go to bed.
I had a great deal more time for reading and meditation in my lonely
cell than one would think by the above routine. I was put to work in
the shop making chairs. It was the first time I had ever worked in my
life, and I took my time about it. I felt no strong desire to work for
the State. I was expected to cane a hundred chairs a day, but I usually
caned about two. I did not believe in work. I felt at that time that
New York State owed me a living. I was getting a living all right, but
I was ungrateful. I did not thank them a wee bit. I must have been a
bad example to other "cons," for they began to get as tired as myself.
At any rate, I lost my job, and was sent back to my cell, where I
stayed most of the time while at Sing Sing.
I worked, indeed, very little at any time during my three bits in the
penitentiary. The prison at Sing Sing, during the nine months I was
there on my first term, was very crowded, and there was not enough work
to go round; and I was absolutely idle most of the time. When I had
been drafted to Auburn I found more work to do, but still very little,
for it was just then that the legislature had shut down on contract
labor in the prisons. The outside merchants squealed because they could
not compete with unpaid convict labor; and so the prison authorities
had to shut down many of their shops, running only enough to supply
the inside demand, which was slight. For eighteen months at Auburn I
did not work a day. I think it was a very bad thing for the health of
convicts when this law was passed; for certainly idleness is a very bad
thing for most of them; and to be shut up nearly all the time in damp,
unhealthy cells like those at Sing Sing, is a terrible strain on the
human system.
Personally, however, I liked to be in my cell, especially during my
first year of solitary confinement, before my health began to give
way; for I had my books from the good prison libraries, my pipe or
cigarettes, and last, but not least, I had a certain portion of opium
that I used every day.
For me, prison life had one great advantage. It broke down my health
and confirmed me for many years in the opium habit, as we shall see;
but I educated myself while in stir. Previous to going to Sing Sing my
education had been almost entirely in the line of graft; but in stir,
I read the English classics and became familiar with philosophy and the
science of medicine and learned something about chemistry.
One of my favorite authors was Voltaire, whom I read, of course, in a
translation. His "Dictionary" was contraband in prison but I read it
with profit. Voltaire was certainly one of the shrewdest of men, and
as up to snuff as any cynical grafter I know, and yet he had a great
love for humanity. He was the philosopher of humanity. Goethe said
that Luther threw the world back two hundred years, but I deny it; for
Luther, like Voltaire, pointed out the ignorance and wickedness of the
priests of their day. These churchmen did not understand the teachings
of Christ. Was Voltaire delusional? The priests must have thought so,
but they were no judges, for they were far worse and less humane than
the French revolutionists. The latter killed outright, but the priests
tortured in the name of the Most Humane. I never approved of the
methods of the French revolutionists, but certainly they were gentle in
comparison with the priests of the Spanish Inquisition.
I think that, in variety of subjects, Voltaire has no equal among
writers. Shrewd as he was, he had a soul, and his moral courage was
grand. His defense of young Barry, who was arrested for using language
against the church, showed his kindness and breadth of mind. On his
arrival in Paris, when he was only a stripling, he denounced the
cowardly, fawning sycophants who surrounded Louis XIV,[B] and wrote
a sarcastic poem on His Nibs, and was confined in the Bastille for
two years. His courage, his wit, his sarcasms, his hatred of his
persecutors, and his love and kindness, stamp him as one of the great,
healthy intellects of mankind. What a clever book is _Candide_! What
satire! What wit! As I lay on my cot how often I laughed at his caustic
comments on humanity! And how he could hate! I never yet met a man of
any account who was not a good hater. I own that Voltaire was ungallant
toward the fair sex. But that was his only fault.
I enjoyed Victor Hugo because he could create a great character, and
was capable of writing a story with a plot. I rank him as a master
of fiction, although I preferred his experience as a traveller, to
his novels, which are not real enough. Ernest Renan was a bracing
and clever writer, but I was sadly disappointed in reading his _Life
of Jesus_. I expected to get a true outline of Christ's time and
a character sketch of the man himself, but I didn't. I went to the
fountain for a glass of good wine, but got only red lemonade.
I liked Dumas, and revelled in the series beginning with _The Three
Musketeers_. I could not read Dumas now, however. I also enjoyed
Gaboriau and Du Boisgobey, for they are very sensational; but that was
during my first term in stir. I could not turn a page of their books
now, for they would seem idiotic to me. Balzac is a bird of another
feather. In my opinion he was one of the best dissectors of human
nature that the world ever produced. Not even Shakespeare was his
equal. His depth in searching for motives, his discernment in detecting
a hypocrite, his skill in showing up women, with their follies, their
loves, their little hypocrisies, their endearments, their malice and
their envy is unrivalled. It is right that Balzac should show woman
with all her faults and follies and virtues, for if she did not possess
all these characteristics, how could man adore her?
In his line I think Thackeray is as great as Balzac. When I had read
_Vanity Fair_, _Pendennis_, _The Newcomes_ and _Barry Lyndon_, I was
so much interested that I read anything of his I could lay my hands
on, over and over again. With a novel of Thackeray's in my hand I would
become oblivious to my surroundings, and long to know something of this
writers personality. I think I formed his mental make-up correctly,
for I imagined him to be gentle and humane. Any man with ability and
brains equal to his could not be otherwise. What a character is Becky
Sharp! In her way she was as clever a grafter as Sheenie Annie. She did
not love Rawdon as a good wife should. If she had she would not be the
interesting Becky that she is. She was grateful to Rawdon for three
reasons; first, he married her; second, he gave her a glimpse into a
station in life her soul longed for; third, he came from a good family,
and was a soldier and tall, and it is well-known that little women
like big men. Then Rawdon amused Becky. She often grinned at his lack
of brains. She grinned at everything, and when we learn that Becky got
religion at the end of the book, instead of saying, God bless her, we
only grin, too.
_Pendennis_ is a healthy book. I always sympathize with Pen and Laura
in their struggles to get on, and when the baby was born I was willing
to become Godpapa, just for its Mamma's sake. _The Newcomes_ I call
Thackeray's masterpiece. It is truer to life than any other book I
ever read. Take the scene where young Clive throws the glass of wine
in his cousin's face. The honest horror of the father, his indignation
when old Captain Costigan uses bad language, his exit when he hears a
song in the Music Hall--all this is true realism. But the scene that
makes this book Thackeray's masterpiece is that where the old Colonel
is dying. The touching devotion of Madam and Ethel, the love for old
Tom, his last word "_adsum_" the quiet weeping of his nurse, and the
last duties to the dead; the beautiful tenderness of the two women, of
a kind that makes the fair sex respected by all men--I can never forget
this scene till my dying day.
When I was sick in stir a better tonic than the quack could prescribe
was Thackeray's _Book of Snobs_. Many is the night I could not sleep
until I had read this book with a relish. It acted on me like a bottle
of good wine, leaving me peaceful after a time of pleasure. In this
book are shown up the little egotisms of the goslings and the foibles
of the sucklings in a masterly manner.
I read every word Dickens ever wrote; and I often ruminated in my
mind as to which of his works is the masterpiece. _Our Mutual Friend_
is weak in the love scenes, but the book is made readable by two
characters, Noddy Boffin and Silas Wegg. Where Wegg reads, as he
thinks, _The Last of the Russians_, when the book was _The Decline and
Fall Of the Roman Empire_, there is the quintessence of humor. Silas's
wooden leg and his occupation of selling eggs would make anybody smile,
even a dip who had fallen and had no money to square it.
The greatest character in _David Copperfield_ is Uriah Heep. The prison
scene where this humble hypocrite showed he knew his Bible thoroughly,
and knew the advantage of having some holy quotations pat, reminded
me often of men I have known in Auburn and Sing Sing prisons. Some
hypocritical jail-bird would dream that he could succeed on the outside
by becoming a Sunday School superintendent; and four of the meanest
thieves I ever knew got their start in that way. Who has not enjoyed
Micawber, with his frothy personality and straitened circumstances,
and the unctuous Barkis.--Poor Emily! Who could blame her? What woman
could help liking Steerforth? It is strange and true that good women
are won by men they know to be rascals. Is it the contrast between Good
and Evil, or is it because the ne'er-do-well has a stronger character
and more magnetic force? Agnes was one of the best women in the world.
Contrast her with David's first wife. Agnes was like a fine violin,
while Dora was like a wailing hurdy-gurdy.
_Oliver Twist_ is Dickens's strongest book. He goes deeper into human
nature there than in any other of his writings. Fagin, the Jew, is a
very strong character, but overdrawn. The picture of Fagin's dens and
of the people in them, is true to life. I have seen similar gatherings
many a time. The ramblings of the Artful Dodger are drawn from the real
thing, but I never met in real life such a brutal character as Bill
Sykes; and I have met some tough grafters, as the course of this book
will show. Nancy Sykes, however, is true to life. In her degradation
she was still a woman. I contend that a woman is never so low but a
man was the cause. One passage in the book has often touched me, as it
showed that Nancy had not lost her sex. When she and Bill were passing
the prison, she turned towards it and said: "Bill, they were fine
fellows that died to-day." "Shut your mouth," said Bill. Now I don't
think there is a thief in the United States who would have answered
Nancy's remark that way. Strong arm workers who would beat your brains
out for a few dollars would be moved by that touch of pity in Nancy's
voice.
But Oliver himself is the great character, and his story reminds me
of my own. The touching incident in the work-house where his poor
stomach is not full, and he asks for a second platter of mush to the
horror of the teachers, is not overdrawn. When I was in one of our
penal institutions, at a later time of my life, I was ill, and asked
for extra food; but my request was looked upon as the audacity of a
hardened villain. I had many such opportunities to think of Oliver.
I always liked those authors who wrote as near life as decency would
permit. Sterne's _Tristram Shandy_ has often amused me, and _Tom
Jones_, _Roderick Random_ and _Peregrine Pickle_ I have read over and
over again. I don't see why good people object to such books. Some
people are forever looking after the affairs of others and neglecting
their own; especially a man whom I will call Common Socks who has put
himself up as a mentor for over seventy millions of people. Let me tell
the busy ladies who are afraid that such books will harm the morals of
young persons that the more they are cried down the more they will be
read. For that matter they ought to be read. Why object to the girl
of sixteen reading such books and not to the woman of thirty-five?
I think their mental strength is about equal. Both are romantic and
the woman of thirty-five will fall in love as quickly as the girl of
sixteen. I think a woman is always a girl; at least, it has been so in
my experience. One day I was grafting in Philadelphia. It was raining,
and a woman was walking along on Walnut Street. She slipped on the wet
sidewalk and fell. I ran to her assistance, and saw that her figure was
slim and girlish and that she had a round, rosy face, but that her hair
was pure white. When I asked her if she was hurt, she said "yes," but
when I said "Let me be your grandson and support you on my way," I put
my foot into it, for, horrors! the look she gave me, as she said in an
icy voice, "I was never married!" I wondered what manner of men there
were in Philadelphia, and, to square myself, I said: "Never married!
and with a pair of such pretty ankles!" Then she gave me a look,
thanked me, and walked away as jauntily as she ever did in her life,
though she must have been suffering agonies from her sprained ankle.
Since that time I have been convinced that they of the gentle sex are
girls from fifteen to eighty.
I read much of Lever, too, while I was in stir. His pictures of Ireland
and of the noisy strife in Parliament, the description of Dublin with
its spendthrifts and excited populace, the gamblers and the ruined but
gay young gentlemen, all mixed up with the grandeur of Ireland, are the
work of a master. I could only compare this epoch of worn-out regalia
with a St. Patrick's day parade twenty years ago in the fourth ward of
Manhattan.
Other books I read in stir were Gibbon's _Roman Empire_, Carlyle's
_Frederick the Great_, and many of the English poets. I read
Wordsworth, Gray and Goldsmith, but I liked Tom Moore and Robert Burns
better. The greatest of all the poets, however, in my estimation, is
Byron. His loves were many, his adventures daring, and his language was
as broad and independent as his mind.
FOOTNOTE:
[B] _Sic._ (Editor's Note.)