Here, as in all other prison hospitals I have visited, diet, stimulants, and medicine are absolutely at the discretion of the Director. No matter what the cost, the spark of life must be kept alive as long as possible in the breast of the murderer, the forger, and the thief, or the criminal whose light of reason has already been quenched in the darkness of the Black Cell. In fact, so careful are the authorities of their patients’ general health that they give them nothing in the way of meat but the best beef and mutton that can be imported from Australia; Caledonian fed meat is not considered nourishing enough. In normal times the death-rate of Ile Nou, which is wholly given over to convict camps, is two or three per cent. lower than that of the town of Noumea. [Illustration: Part of the Hospital Buildings, Ile Nou. The roofed-terrace in front is where the patients take their siesta in the middle of the day. One of these is attached to each court of the Hospital. Some of the mattresses may be seen to the right.] Then from this little flowery paradise of rest and quietness we went across the road to another enclosure in which there were two long, white buildings, a prison and a row of offices, at right angles to each other. This was the “bad” side. On the other there had been invalids and invalid lunatics; here there were only lunatics, and mostly dangerous at that—men who, after being criminals, had become madmen; not like the dwellers in Broadmoor, who are only criminal because they are mad. I once paid a visit to the worst part of the men’s side at Broadmoor, but I don’t think it was quite as bad as the long corridor which led through that gruesome home of madness. On either hand were heavy black-painted, iron doors, and inside these a hinged grating through which the prisoner could be fed. The cells were about nine feet by six feet. They had neither furniture nor bedclothes in them. The furniture would have been smashed up either in sheer wanton destruction or for use as missiles to hurl through the grating, and the bedclothes would have been torn up into strips for hanging or strangling purposes. It has been my good or bad luck to see poor humanity in a good many shapes and guises, but I never saw such a series of pitiful parodies of manhood as I saw when those cell doors were opened. Some were crouched down in the corners of their cells, muttering to themselves and picking the sacking in which they were clothed to pieces, thread by thread. It was no use giving them regular prison clothing, for they would pick themselves naked in a couple of days. Others were walking up and down the narrow limits of their cells, staring with horribly vacant eyes at the roof or the floor, and not taking the slightest notice of us.