My friend and I, our ordeal completed, were returned to our
cells to think it over. The walls and ceiling of the cells are painted a
light gray color; it is against the rules, except by special indulgence,
to affix pictures or other objects to them. The "coddling of criminals,"
so widely advertised, does not include permission to give a homelike
look to their perennial quarters; it is more conducive to moral reform
that they should contemplate painted steel. There was one camp-stool in
our cell; later, cells were supplied with two wooden chairs, the seats
sloping at such an angle with the backs as rendered sitting a penance;
cushions were not provided. I remember seeing similar contrivances in
old English cathedrals, relics of a day when monks had to be kept from
falling asleep during the religious rites. We might also sit upon the
lower bunk, bent forward in such an attitude as would avert bumping our
heads against the upper one. Each convict, early in his sojourn, has a
religious interview with the Chaplain, who presents him with a copy of
the New Testament--not also of the Old; you may remember that the latter
records certain regrettable incidents of a sinister and immoral sort,
calculated, I presume, to shock the tender budding impulses toward
regeneration of prison readers. One may get other books of a secular
kind from the library, upon written application; and prisoners of the
first grade may subscribe for newspapers that contain no objectionable
matter.
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