This Jail is the best constructed, of any that I have seen in England, the regulations by which it is governed are exceedingly wise and humane; and it possesses the grand requisite of a Governor, who discharges his duty with equal zeal and fidelity.

The nature of the building will be easily understood. An external wall surrounds the whole: the Governor's house is in the center; from its windows every yard is visible, and it is hardly possible, that any breach of the rules can be practised without being observed, either by himself or some one of his family. He told me that the experience of twenty years as a jailer, had taught him that the main points for prison discipline, for the security, morals, and health of the prisoners, are:–

Classification–Employment–and Cleanliness.

Classification is carried to almost its greatest limit. There is a separate building and yard, for prisoners of the following descriptions:–

Males.

1. No. 1 and 2. Debtors.

2. 3. King's Evidence, when there are any; and occasionally other prisoners.

3. 4. Convicted of misdemeanors, and small offences.

4. 5. Transports, and convicted of atrocious felonies.

5. 6. Untried for atrocious offences.

6. 7. Untried for small offences.

Females.

1. 8. Debtors.

2. 9. For trial.

3. 10. Convicted of misdemeanors.

4. 11. Convicted of felonies.

There is a well merited discretion given to the Governor, to alter these rules, in the following manner:–a notorious thief, who has before been imprisoned, may be apprehended for a petty offence.

A fresh expedition against the Spaniards was in agitation from the beginning of this year, which occasioned many movements at court, and, as usual, disturbed the mind of the queen with various perplexities. Her captious favor towards Essex, and the arts employed by him to gain his will on every contested point, are well illustrated in the letters of Rowland White, to which we must again recur.

On February twenty-second he writes: “My lord of Essex kept his bed the most part of all yesterday; yet did one of his chamber tell me, he could not weep for it, for he knew his lord was not sick. There is not a day passes that the queen sends not often to see him, and himself every day goeth privately to her.” Two days after, he reports that “my lord of Essex comes out of his chamber in his gown and night-cap..… Full fourteen days his lordship kept in; her majesty, as I heard, resolved to break him of his will and to pull down his great heart, who found it a thing impossible, and says he holds it from the mother's side; but all is well again, and no doubt he will grow a mighty man in our state.”

The earl of Cumberland made “some doubt of his going to sea,” because lord Thomas Howard and Raleigh were to be joined with him in equal authority; the queen mentioned the subject to him, and on his repeating to herself his refusal, he was “well chidden.”

Whether or not it was with a view of impeding the marriage of the queen of Scots that Elizabeth had originally encouraged the renewal of the proposals of the archduke to herself, certain it is that the treaty was still carried on, and even with increased earnestness, long after this motive had ceased to operate.

It was subsequently to Mary's announcement of her approaching nuptials, that to the instances of the imperial ambassador Elizabeth had replied, that she desired to keep herself free till she had finally decided on the answer to be given to the king of France, who had also offered her his hand. After breaking off this negotiation with Charles IX., she declared to the same ambassador, that she would never engage to marry a person whom she had not seen;—an answer which seemed to hint to the archduke that a visit would be well received. It was accordingly reported with confidence that this prince would soon commence his journey to England; and Cecil himself ventured to write to a friend, that if he would accede to the national religion, and if his person proved acceptable to her majesty, “except God should please to continue his displeasure against us, we should see some success.” But he thought that the archduke would never explain himself on religion to any one except the queen, and not to her until he should see hopes of speeding.

Non fortia loquor, sed possibilia

If I have been so fortunate as to convince my readers, that crime and misery are the natural and necessary consequences of our present system of prison discipline. I must now endeavour to demonstrate, that these may be avoided. I do nothing, I freely admit, if I shew that these evils exist, without proving that they might have been prevented. I may be answered thus:–It is true, that our jails are nurseries, schools, and colleges of vice;–true, our prisoners are rendered miserable as well as guilty;– true, their health and morals are tainted; but guilt and wretchedness are the inseparable concomitants of confinement, and must ever be so.

To prove that the reverse of all this is true,–that instead of health being impaired, it may be improved; that instead of morals being corrupted, they may be reformed; that these objects, so desirable to the state, may be accomplished by methods humane to the criminal, by a system of classification, industry, and religious instruction, is the design of the Second Part of this Pamphlet; and, abstaining from abstract reasoning, I shall appeal to experience and example.

About four years ago, Mrs. Fry was induced to visit Newgate, by the representations of its state, made by some persons of the Society of Friends.

She found the female side in a situation, which no language can describe. Nearly three hundred women, sent there for every gradation of crime, some untried, and some under sentence of death, were crowded together in the two wards and two cells, which are now appropriated to the untried, and which are found quite inadequate to contain even this diminished number, with any tolerable convenience. Here they saw their friends, and kept their multitudes of children, and they had no other place for cooking, washing, eating, and sleeping.

They slept on the floor at times one hundred and twenty in one ward, without so much as a mat for bedding, and many of them were very nearly naked. She saw them openly drinking spirits, and her ears were offended by the most terrible imprecations. Every thing was filthy to excess, and the smell was quite disgusting. Every one, even the Governor, was reluctant to go amongst them. He persuaded her to leave her watch in the office, telling her that his presence would not prevent its being torn from her. She saw enough to convince her that every thing bad was going on.

The accession of Francis II., husband to the queen of Scots, to the French throne had renewed the dangers of Elizabeth from the hostility of France and of Scotland; and in the politic resolution of removing from her own territory to that of her enemies the seat of a war which she saw to be inevitable, she levied a strong army and sent it under the command of the duke of Norfolk and lord Grey de Wilton to the frontiers of Scotland. She also entered into a close connexion with the protestant party in that country, who were already in arms against the queen-regent and her French auxiliaries. Success attended this well-planned expedition, and at the end of a single campaign Elizabeth was able to terminate the war by the treaty of Edinburgh; a convention the terms of which were such as effectually to secure her from all fear of future molestation in this quarter.

During the period of these hostilities, however, her situation was an anxious one. It was greatly to be feared that the emperor and the king of Spain, forgetting in their zeal for the catholic church the habitual enmity of the house of Austria against that of Bourbon, would make common cause with France against a sovereign who now stood forth the avowed protectress of protestantism; and such a combination of the great powers of Europe, seconded by a large catholic party at home, England was by no means in a condition to withstand.