On his return to Cardington, he occupied himself, as before, with plans to improve the condition of his tenantry; building for them better houses, and erecting a school. But at length an event occurred which supplied his self-consuming energy with the noble task it craved. Elected High Sheriff for the county of Bedford, the duties of his office led him to the interior of the prison. He witnessed the sufferings, the extortion, the injustice, the manifold cruelty, which the supineness of the legislature allowed to reign and riot there. "The distress of prisoners," he tells us, in the preface to his first report, "came more immediately under my notice, when I was sheriff of the county of Bedford; and the circumstance which excited me to activity in their behalf was the seeing some, who, by the verdict of juries, were declared _not guilty_; some, on whom the grand jury did not find such an appearance of guilt as subjected them to trial; and some, whose prosecutors did not appear against them; after having been confined for months, dragged back to jail, and locked up again, till they should pay _sundry fees_ to the jailor, the clerk of assize, &c. In order to redress this hardship, I applied to the justices of the county for a salary to the jailor in lieu of his fees. The bench were properly affected with the grievance, and willing to grant the relief desired; but they wanted a precedent for charging the county with the expense. I, therefore, rode into several neighbouring counties in search of a precedent; but I soon learned that the same injustice was practised in them; and, looking into the prisons, I beheld scenes of calamity, which I grew daily more and more anxious to alleviate." These oppressions, these calamities he dragged to light. He may be said to have _discovered_ them--so indifferent, at this time, was one class of the community to the misery of another. His official position gave him just that elevation requisite to make his voice heard. The attention of parliament was roused. He was examined before a committee of the whole House; he received the thanks of parliament; and a bill was passed to remunerate the jailor by a salary, instead of by fees--thus remedying one of the most extraordinary mal-practices that was surely ever endured in a civilised society.