A great extension of convict labour has been seen in recent years. It has been employed in novel ways which would have been impossible but for the excellence of the present prison organisation and of the discipline now enforced. In 1876 a small prison for one hundred inmates was erected at Chattenden, near Upnor, on the north bank of the Medway. It was intended to house convicts to be engaged in constructing new magazines at Chattenden for the war department. The prison was built by a detachment of prisoners sent across the river from Chatham convict prison, and then by tramway to the site of the proposed work. The tramway passed through dense woods, and the site of the prison was surrounded by thick undergrowth. These seemingly hazardous operations were carried out without a casualty of any kind; no gang chains were used; no escapes, successful or frustrated, were recorded. The work was continued for nearly ten years, when the magazines were finished, and the prison, which throughout had been treated as a branch of the great headquarters prison at Chatham, was closed. During these ten years, besides the prison buildings, this small party had put up five large bomb-proof magazines, in addition to the formation and drainage of the roads, traverses and slopes adjoining. The experiment at Chattenden afforded an example of the use to which convict labour can be put, and of the circumstances under which comparatively small works can be undertaken by a small body of convicts in a separate prison erected for the purpose. A number of the buildings, being easily removable, have since been taken down to be otherwise made use of. It is only fair to observe here that the same experiment had been made under the Austro-Hungarian government by M. Tauffer. This eminent prison official had recommended the adoption of the "progressive system" as far back as 1866, and had carried it out under his own direction at Leopoldstadt and Lepoglava, where his prisoners were employed on outside labour at the rate of thirty or even forty to each overseer, and yet no escapes occurred. These prisoners built another prison at a distance from Lepoglava, and were lodged for the purpose in sheds and outhouses beyond the prison walls. The doors were not even locked at night; there were no bolts or bars, the only barrier to escape being the rule that no one should leave the building after the hour for retiring at night.