horses attached, was to call and take her to the Downs. And who do you think was to be her cavalier on the occasion? I dare not tell you yet; but you shall hear speedily.

Yes; the parties given by the Baroness Dela Haute Gueuse were undeniably splendid, although their locality was certainly in the Debateable Land. They were not like Mrs. Armytage's Parisian soirées. They did not in the least resemble the dull and vulgar, yet pretentious, shams of well-conducted parties, common among the "upper five hundred" of a class I disdain to particularise. The Southbank might have sighed as often and as vainly as Queen Dido in the ballad before she could have obtained a card for the Baroness's parties. The oddest thing about them was that nobody seemed to know exactly where she lived. The great dandies, the gorgeous guardsmen, the foreign diplomates, used to be taken there late at night by other dandies, guardsmen, and diplomates, who, in their turn, had been taken there by others. You used to wake late the next morning with a headache, and a misty consciousness of having had a very good supper over-night, and had rather too much champagne. You had seen a multitude of wax-candles and many jewels. You had been permitted at one stage of the entertainment to smoke. Perhaps you found a white camelia or a lady's glove in your pocket. It was as though you had been to see the Adalantado of the Seven Cities. whom Washington Irving discourses of so sweetly: the only drawbacks to the pleasurable reminiscences of the evening were that champagneheadache and the discovery that you had lost all the money you had about you. Generally you found a cabman's ticket in lieu of your portemonnaie. The cabman would call for his fare about noon, demanding seven-and-sixpence; and in answer to your inquiries would politely inform you that you and another gentleman had hailed him at Hyde-Park Corner, whence you were driven, at your own request, to Paddington Green, where the other gentleman alighted, and so you had been driven eventually home. You paid the cabman, but you never saw that other gentleman again.

It would have been well for Florence Armytage if she, too, had been driven to Paddington, and to the terminus of the Great Western Railway, and had so taken train any where away from the hunters. Of what close and narrow chances is Life made up? But for the merest chance in the world Mr. Sims might have dropped in at the Baroness's-where he was very well known—and there met not only Mrs. Armytage, but a gentleman of cheerful guise and jocund conversation, who, as a strange adjunct to full evening-costume, wore his heart upon his sleeve. Oh! Simon Lefranc was there; and Florence was introduced to him. He was Count Somebody, and wore a full moustache and whisker and a curly black wig; and the little woman thought him very droll, and did not in the least recognise him as the impudent-looking person with a face like that of a paillasse, who had stared at her that morning through the coffee-room window of the Soho Chambers.

The Race on the Downs that May-day was the most brilliant that had ever been seen for years. The sun shone glaring hot, and the dust was somewhat choking; but summer toilettes and parasols will defy the sun, and lobster-salads and iced drinks will allay the dust. There were more things which took place at this particular Race than had been known to occur for many years. "Teddy the Tyler" was the horse that won the great stake; but the events that accompanied his progress to the judge's chair are of too much importance to be dismissed at the fag-end of a chapter. If you please, we will let "Teddy the Tyler," and the champagne, and the lobsters wait a little. Very shortly you shall have a correct card of the entire proceedings.

Three gentleman had to meet by appointment at the Grand Stand at three p.m. The police were rapidly clearing the course, in their admired broom-like fashion, about that time; for "Teddy the Tyler," with his three-and-twenty competitors, were all saddled and bridled, and Teddy the Tyler's jockey, with his three-and-twenty competitors, had all received their last instructions from their trainers and owners. The superintendent of police, who was directing the clearing of the course, gave a friendly nod as he passed the three gentlemen, who, too discreet to interfere with the discipline of the day, were retiring from the course. "Pleasure or business?" asked the Superintendent, leaning over his saddle-bow.

"A little of both," answered Inspector Millament; "more of the former, perhaps."

"Lots of tip-top swells here," remarked Sergeant South.

"Every body. Sir Jasper Goldthorpe and party just driven on to the Hill. His son the captain's betting away in the ring like mad. Friend of yours?" and the Superintendent indicated with a wave of his whip Simon Lefranc, who, with his heart pinned to the sleeve of a gauzy coat, constructed expressly "for the races," was standing a little apart.

per.

"French,-just come across," the Inspector returned in a hasty whis"Deuce of a heavy job. Murder. One of their best men.

bye."

Good

So the course was cleared, and, after many false starts, the race was run. "Teddy the Tyler" winning by a neck.

"My horse! my horse!" cried little Mrs. Armytage, in great glee, from her carriage-window. She was not the owner of the animal; but she had backed him heavily, and stood to win a good deal of money. How lucky Florence Armytage had been that week to be sure!

My Convict Experiences.

Ir any one of the half-million people whose acquaintance I have the honour of possessing had seen me one evening last June at the Waterloo Station of the South-Western Railway, and knowing that my avocations require my constant presence in town save during the months of August or September, and beholding me carpet-bag carrying and railway-rugged, had inquired what was my errand, I should have answered-what? I should have said, perhaps, that, though Londoner to the backbone, and of the streets streety, though fond of, and indulging in, that "cockney chatter" so offensive to well-regulated and genial critics, I am one of those "fellows who want to know, you know," who like to see life in every aspect, who love to form their own impressions on subjects occupying the public mind, and who, to the best of their ability, strive to enter into, to comprehend, and to describe, all phases of society within their immediate ken, or to which they have opportunities of access. Perhaps I have been down in a diving-bell and up in a balloon; perhaps I have ridden on a camel's back under the shadow of the Pyramids, or made one in an unruly party in a pleasure-van to Hampton Court on a Sunday afternoon; perhaps I have passed one evening in the green-room of a theatre, and the next in a solitary cell in a Trappist monastery; perhaps I have dined on Monday with the Lord Mayor, and on Tuesday with Duke Humphrey and all with the aim and intent of "seeing life." For weeks past I had been reading, hearing, and thinking of our convict system. The newspapers had informed me of the attempted outbreak at Chatham, and its prompt repression; a ready pen had described the advantages of the criminal treatment in the sister island; and the attention of the public had been drawn towards the subject. It was my purpose, then, to see with my own eyes and hear with my own ears; nothing to extenuate, nor to set down aught in malice; to bow to no Governmental influence, to be warped by no popular outcry, but to constitute myself a Special Correspondent of the readers of Temple Bar, and, armed with all necessary authority (and blue-books without end), to visit some of the principal receptacles for our "convicts at home," and to describe what I there might see and hear.

So far as I can learn, and I have made it my business to learn as much as I can, there has been of late an attempt to exalt the Irish system of convict discipline by a corresponding depreciation of the system adopted in England. Now the question itself is so important, and the manner of its administration is fraught with such serious results to society, that its discussion must not be undertaken with the smallest bias towards either system; we must not be shown the excellencies of one administration, of which excellencies we immediately constitute ourselves printed champions, because it would not be in human nature for us pleasantly to

eat our words, and allow equal merit in the other system, which we had not inquired into when we formed our first recorded impressions; nor should we ever be disposed to forgive ourselves for having been self-constituted judge, and given our sentence without hearing both sides of the question at issue. The system in operation in England admits of personal inspection, and is fully described in blue books; the system in operation in Ireland stands forth chiefly in the gratulatory trumpeting of its admirers. We will, so far as lies within us, endeavour to judge between the two. If, however, we are to believe all we hear, or only listen to conflicting statements, we shall probably end where we began, by knowing very little about the matter.

It may therefore not be devoid of interest briefly to indicate the leading points to which attention appears to have been directed, and thus to narrow the issue, and obtain, if we can, an insight into the impenetrable mystery which has hitherto enveloped the subject.

It requires no great research into the depths of the ponderous volumes we have consulted to discover that punishment and reformation are the objects aimed at, and it is evident that they are found to be in some sort antagonistic. This involves delicate handling to make them travel in the same groove; and looking to the character of the mass on which this manipulation is to be exercised,-how this measure is adapted to gain one point and that another at an opposite angle of the judicial and social compass, it is obvious very nice adjustment is necessary. Indeed we cannot imagine a much more difficult task, or one requiring the good offices of hardheaded, earnest, and persevering men to attempt it with a chance of success. However, we admit it was worth a trial, for as a nation we ought to blush at the neglects of former times, the earlier annals of prisons and transportation presenting as they do a black catalogue of crime on the part of those who permitted such atrocities as are there disclosed. The unhappy victims on whom the effects of the neglect fell were perhaps the less criminal of the two classes. Let us, however, forget the past, and take a glance at the present and the future.

The principles of the present convict system appear to have been laid down by the then Lord Stanley and Sir James Graham in 1842; separate confinement in Pentonville, determined on by Lord John Russell in 1838, being introduced at the former period, but not generally applied.

The English system, as renovated in 1848, and still in operation as far as circumstances permit, consists of three distinct probationary periods. First, separate confinement from nine to twelve months, which, for want of a better word, I will call Pentonvillism. Second, penal servitude in progressive stages, at Portland, for a period proportioned to the sentence (the whole being intermediate between imprisonment and liberty), which I venture to call Portlandism. Third, a probationary period, followed by a ticket-of-leave under certain restrictions, in one of the Colonies, for which West Australianism is the best name I can find.

Pentonville and Portland are examples of the prisons in which the

two first periods of probation are carried out. The former I had already visited. A Hansom cab took me from the heart of the city to that large solemn building, which I had so often gazed on in boyhood, and which was then known to me as "the Model Prison." Passing through the heavy outer gates, I was shown into a small room, where I awaited the advent of the governor; and here I was first impressed with that dead solemn silence, that "stillness which can be felt,"-which I have since found to be a characteristic of all convict establishments. Outside I had left the full hum and roar of life; the cabs and omnibuses of the New Road were within a few hundred feet; flocks of sheep and droves of cattle, which had been "late on sale," yet meandered about on their way from the neighbouring cattle-market; even now in sight of our elevated position were the blue shining boards of proximate public-houses;-and yet we seemed entirely excluded from the world, and I could have heard a pin fall. So impressed was I with this silence, that I immediately mentioned my feelings to the governor, who told me that the dinner-hour was then on, but that on its finishing, in a few minutes, I should hear sounds of returning life. He was right; there came a pattering of feet, a clanging of doors, a ringing of wheels on rails; but it seemed to me merely momentary, and then the dead silence reigned again. Before going out on my personal examination, I inquired about the regulation routine of these convicts; and from the governor I learned that prisoners under sentence of penal servitude are in the first place removed from their prisons to Millbank Penitentiary, where they remain some three weeks. This is the first stage of their cleansing; here they have time to reflect on their past lives, and here they generally make up their minds for good or evil, i. e. they determine whether to be docile and tractable, or obstinate and defiant. After an examination by the medical man, all such as at the end of this period are in a proper state of health are sent to Pentonville. Here another medical examination of the incoming batch is made; they pass review in the reception-ward, undergo a second ceremony of the bath (they had been bathed previously to leaving their old quarters), and then such as have been working at a trade in their better days renew their old acquaintance at their peculiar labour, while others-hitherto ignorant of any useful calling-are affiliated to weaving, shoe-making, rug and mat making, &c.

The life of a convict at Pentonville is thus divided: he rises at 6, dresses himself, cleans out his cell, and puts it in order; from 6.30 to 7.30 he is at his trade-work; then his breakfast is served out to him. Each convict eats every meal in his own separate cell. The allowance is served out in tin pannikins; these pannikins are sent up some score at a time from the kitchen by a "lift" to a central position in each of the galleries; a trayful of pannikins on wheels is then placed on a double line of rails running the whole length of each corridor; an impetus is given to the train, which runs swiftly along, and is stopped at certain positions by the officers, who distribute the pan