It is the small industries,
such as shoemaking and carpentry, which crush the same free
industries all round the prison, for they cannot stand against the
artificial competition created by the nominal wages of the prison
hands. Though for moral and financial reasons the convicts
must work, it is evident that on these grounds we cannot accept
the cellular system as a pattern of prison organisation.
It is quite sufficient, in prisons for the segregation of
criminals, to provide for isolation by night, which requires
buildings far more simple and less costly than those of the
cellular prisons.
Work in the open air is the only useful basis of organisation for
convict prisons.
Air, light, movement, field labour, especially in southern
counties and for the majority of prisoners, who are rural--these
are the only physical and moral disinfectants possible for
prisoners not entirely degenerate, or likely to prevent at least
the absolute brutalisation of the incorrigible, by giving them
healthy and more remunerative work.
The penal agricultural colony, in lands which need clearing, is
the best for adults, passing from the least to the most healthy
according to the categories of criminals--born, habitual,
occasional--and according to the gravity of the crimes committed.
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