a terrible condition. Howard found 143 slaves in chains, many quite naked, in two rooms, not ten feet high, containing a double tier of beds.

Crossing the Sound into Sweden, he was delighted with the cheerful aspect of the towns and villages there, but all the gaols were filthy; no irons, however, were used in them. The prisons in Stockholm showed the common vices of our English gaols more than any others on the Continent.

He now turned to Russia, then ruled by the iron will of Catherine. Howard's reputation was now so wide-spread, that wherever his presence was expected, preparations were made to receive him, and prisons, hospitals, and houses of correction, were cleaned up for review. Against this he took all possible precautions, and nowhere was it more necessary to do so than in Russia, then the country of tricks, pretension, pantomime, and imposture, where pasteboard villages sprang up on imperial estates, and picturesque peasants were made to order, by a Muscovite showman.

Though he took every possible means to avoid recognition, he was discovered immediately on his arrival at St Petersburg, and invited by the empress to Court. His reply was, that he had come to visit the dungeon of the captive, and the abode of the wretched-not the palaces and courts of kings and empresses. Of the favourite Prince Potemkin, however, he saw much. This strange genius encouraged Howard to proceed, offered him every facility, and assured him that his book should, immediately after

its appearance in London, be translated into Rus

sian.

Howard found the system of serfdom or slavery universally prevailing in the country; debtors, too, were considered in much the same light as slaves. The Russian gaols were guarded by the military; they were over-crowded, hot, and offensive; there was no regular allowance of tood, and the prisoners were generally in irons.

He witnessed the infliction of the punishment of the knout on a man and woman, of which he gives a terribly graphic account. Determined to find out what had become of the former of these victims, he suddenly visited the executioner, who, alarmed at his presence, confessed that the criminal had been purposely whipped to death.

With the hospitals and educational establishments at St Petersburg, Howard was much pleased. After visiting Moscow and Warsaw-in the latter city en countering the most miserable objects he had ever seen-he passed through Germany and Holland, and returned to England to pass the Christmas holidays with his boy, at Cardington.

In January 1782 he began a new series of prison inspections in England, Ireland, and Scotland, which occupied him for the entire year. He obtained justice to prisoners whenever it was denied them; he got the dismissal of a surgeon on board an hospital ship at Portsmouth, who culpably neglected his duty to the sufferers. He relieved the wants of 338 Dutch

prisoners of war, who were almost naked and starving on the banks of the Severn. So many, so great, and so full of self-sacrifice were his actions, that he became invested by the imagination of the multitude with a halo of sanctity and heroism. He quelled an alarming riot at the prison of the Savoy, where the mutineers, two hundred strong, had killed two of their keepers, and got entire possession of the prison. Alone and unarmed he entered the building and effected his purpose. By giving his word that their grievances should be carefully looked into, the rioters quietly suffered themselves to be led back to their cells.

The next Christmas was spent at Cardington, but early in 1783 he sailed for Lisbon, and found the prisons of Portugal in some respects superior to those of England. He now travelled into Spain through Toledo to Madrid, carefully inspecting the prisons and hospitals on his route. He found the country abounding in charitable institutions, and containing few beggars. In some places the rack and wheel were still used, irons were common, and, except in the capital, the prisons were fearfully dirty. He was as unsuccessful in Spain, as he had been in Rome, in his attempts, to obtain a glimpse of the Inquisition.

At Valladolid he was shown a portion of it. On seeing some doors which he was not allowed to enter, and on being told that none buť prisoners entered those rooms, he requested to be confined there for a month, to satisfy his curiosity. "None come out

under three years, and they take the vow of secrecy," was the reply.

Travelling home through Paris, he rejoiced to find a great improvement in the state of the prisons there, as well as the growth of a more kindly and humane spirit. At Lille he caught a violent fever, in visiting some sick debtors in a noisome cell, of which he nearly died. At Ghent he found that the "Maison de la Force," formerly the model prison for all Europe, was completely changed-filth where he had left cleanness, idleness where he had seen industry, sickness where he had known health. One man had done it all, and he one of the most benevolent and best intentioned monarchs who ever sat upon a throne. Joseph II., having been persuaded that the works conducted here, were injurious to the manufactures of his empire, had ordered them to be discontinued. No mistake could have been greater, as experience soon proved.

Scarcely had he arrived in London than he began another series of home inspections, which lasted till the end of the year; the entire results he gave to the public, in a second appendix to his great work. And then for a while he retired to his favourite Cardington, to look after his cottages and schools, to enjoy the society of his friends, and to assist in forming the character of his son, now growing up to manhood, a gay and somewhat irregular youth, who had already given his father much trouble, and subsequently caused him the bitterest grief.

C

It is strange, considering how delicate Howard's health had been in early life, that he should have been able with impunity to accomplish so much, and constantly to brave the inspection of fever-haunted dungeons. He appeared to bear a charmed life. God was about his footsteps. His manner of living was singular; he ate no meat, drank neither wine nor spirits, bathed daily in cold water, rose and went to bed early. "Next to the free goodness and mercy of the Author of my being," he says, "temperance and cleanliness are my preservatives. Trusting in Divine Providence, and believing myself in the way of duty, I visit the most noxious cells, and while thus employed, 'I fear no evil.'"

In his earlier journeys he was accompanied generally by one servant, John Prole. Well mounted, they would ride about forty miles a-day. Howard would stop at the best hotels, and to avoid any display of his simple diet, which he feared might be considered a pretext for parsimony, he would order his dinner with beer and wine, but always leave it untasted. Waiters and postillions he paid munificently; he was well known on all the roads, and his humours were appreciated.

During his earlier tours on the Continent he was alone, for Prole having married, he would not separate him from his family; but latterly he had promoted a youth named Thomasson to be the companion of his pilgrimages. He was devoted to his master, but he had many vices, and exercised