As
an intelligent man remarked to me, the convicts know no pleasure
beyond sensuality, and in this they are not gratified. The enormous
bribe which Government possesses in offering free pardons, together
with the deep horror of the secluded penal settlements, destroys
confidence between the convicts, and so prevents crime. As to a
sense of shame, such a feeling does not appear to be known, and of
this I witnessed some very singular proofs. Though it is a curious
fact, I was universally told that the character of the convict
population is one of arrant cowardice; not unfrequently some become
desperate, and quite indifferent as to life, yet a plan requiring
cool or continued courage is seldom put into execution. The worst
feature in the whole case is that although there exists what may be
called a legal reform, and comparatively little is committed which
the law can touch, yet that any moral reform should take place
appears to be quite out of the question. I was assured by
well-informed people that a man who should try to improve, could
not while living with other assigned servants;--his life would be
one of intolerable misery and persecution. Nor must the
contamination of the convict-ships and prisons, both here and in
England, be forgotten.
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