situation at Millbank, from which he was soon dismissed for drunkenness. After this he went rapidly to the bad; was caught, and sentenced for obtaining goods under false pretences, next for robbing a lady at Richmond Park, and now for the third time he entered prison as a garroter. Although they maintained throughout, from the moment of their capture, in the dock and after sentence, an insolent and defiant demeanour, yet in the prison these murderous rogues conducted themselves fairly well; only two of them got into serious trouble. These were Dixon and another, Needham, who together made a vigorous attempt to escape. Dixon cut out, by means of a sharpened nail, the panel in his cell door, unbolted it, got out, and then set Needham also free. Their idea was to surprise the night patrol, and seize his keys. With this object they concealed themselves behind a passage door, and as he appeared struck him behind the ear. Fortunately the blow fell light, and the officer turned to grapple with the prisoners. Such were the men, and such the work they did. Was it strange that the public should complain of a system of penal repression which left them to the tender mercies of ruffians like these? Transportation had been abandoned and what had been given them in exchange? A system which, as administered, had completely failed. It may have been a necessity, but it clearly had not been a success. They might perhaps be compelled to retain, or even to extend it; but its administration must be altered. As it was it had no terrors whatever for the evil-doer, while it gave but little protection to society. So said the _Times_; and it spared no pains to support its views with tangible evidence. Its columns teemed with letters on the subject, and special correspondents visited the chief convict establishments to spy out their nakedness and report their inefficacy as places for the punishment of criminals. Convicts, it was agreed on all sides, quite scoffed at the terrors of penal servitude. Barring the loss of actual liberty, which is doubtless the dearer to a man the closer he approaches to a lower species of animal, the convict prison was made so comfortable to the convict that he was loth to leave it, and hardly dreaded to return. Well-housed, well-fed, with labour just sufficient to insure good digestion and a healthy circulation; debarred only by a fiction of the luxuries he chiefly loved; let free from prison as soon as he chose to evince signs of amendment, a convict was altogether master of the situation. So said the critics. Penal servitude was like going down into the country after "the season." A little slow, perhaps; but very healthy and re-invigorating after a racket in town--just the discipline, in fact, to which men careful of themselves are ready to submit for a time, so as to issue forth afterwards braced and strengthened for a fresh campaign of pleasure. In these retired residences there was rest for the tired thief, for the