'If any man will not work neither let him eat,' is a motto strictly adhered to by the authorities; for no prisoner is allowed meat-dinner who is not employed at hard labour. Those not so engaged are only given porridge and bread-and-milk. When labouring at hard work, prisoners have a meat-dinner every Tuesday and Thursday. Eight ounces of beef without bone and one pint of soup is the allowance. The first class have an additional meat-dinner on Sundays. There is, we see, considerable advantage to be gained by the prisoner, to reward his ambition, should it prompt him to move upward into a higher class. Now this is no trifling matter, for the very essence of good prison discipline is the subordination of mere punishment to reformation; and this system of classification tends not only to preserve a man's self-respect, but to fan the spark of hope that otherwise might be extinguished in his breast. The justly celebrated novel _Never too late to Mend_ has made the public in some degree familiar with the 'silent system' of prison discipline. This system has been found not to work when sentences are for a long period. Speech is discovered to be more than a luxury, being essential to the mental health of prisoners. None now are condemned to the silent system except those who are imprisoned for only a short time. And how great is the punishment of not being allowed to speak, is proved to the chaplain by this one fact. Nowhere are prayers so diligently responded to and hymns sung with such _will_, if without musical taste, as in the chapel of a military prison, for prisoners recognise the service as an opportunity of convincing themselves that they have not become dumb. Until this explanation was given by the governor, I was full of admiration for religion, afterwards discovered to be more loud-sounding than genuine. Prisoners condemned to solitary confinement are forced to turn to the wall on the approach of visitors or the superior officers of the prison. 'Has my face assumed any terrific aspect? Am I so much worse-looking than usual?' This is the thought that naturally comes into one's mind on walking through a military prison for the first time. Each man takes a quick glance at your Gorgon head, and then, fast as lightning, turns his back to you and his face to the wall, until your apparently baneful or bewitching influence has passed.