The “House of Detention” appeared to me the most awfully depressing place to which my erring footsteps had ever led me. The darkness, the stillness, the novelty of the situation, all tended to this conclusion; and I cannot do better than describe what occurred, and leave the verdict in the hands of the reader. Conceive then a man, who an hour previously was a free citizen, suddenly finding himself stepping out of a police van into a gloomy, white-washed passage, and being inspected and counted with a dozen others by a bumptious turnkey, puffed out with his own importance, addicted, as I have previously mentioned, to cold fowl and tongue, but otherwise oblivious to the veriest rudiments of civilization. Conceive, then, the sensations of a man such as I, finding himself suddenly confronted by such a biped, who, scanning first a paper and then you, begins to drawl out, “What’s your name? Your age? Married or single? Protestant or Romanist?” and a volley of such like rubbish, which only tends to exasperate one, and which might well be dispensed with, seeing that all the desired information is on the paper, and, having been supplied by one’s self not an hour before, is sure to be corroborated, whether correct or not, and considering, too, that this farce is repeated every time you enter and leave the place, and which in a case of frequent remands might occur twice a day. One can hardly narrate a single item regarding the treatment of an untried prisoner that does not call for redress, _i.e._, if the absurd theory is still persisted in that an untried man is an innocent one. What right has an innocent man to be debarred the privilege of seeing friends (under reasonable restrictions) as often as he pleases, instead of being limited to one visit of fifteen minutes a day? Why should one be allowed to purchase _Town Talk_ and not _Truth_? Why should the _Graphic_ be permitted and not the _Dramatic News_? These are anomalies no logic can explain away, and have no right to be left to the caprice of a prison official. The food supply as at present arranged is a cruel system; a prisoner under remand is gratified at hearing that he may procure his own food, and naturally shrinks at the idea of subsisting on prison fare till absolutely compelled. No greater mistake ever was made—the latter is good, clean, and supplied gratis; the former is nasty in the extreme, and scandalously dear. If the doubtful “privilege” is to be continued, it is time the government, in common fairness, controlled the tariff; at present a prisoner is at the mercy of the eating-house keeper, and liable to any charge he may choose to make. I must admit that the caterers for the “House of Detention” were civil and comparatively reasonable, whereas those at Newgate were exactly the opposite. I shall give a detailed account later on of how I was fleeced at the Old Bailey, and I would earnestly warn all prisoners awaiting trial to stick to the prison fare,