See chapter 49 for particulars of the subsequent interview. This “_dead wall_” of the prison is also mentioned in the same book as the place where young David requested “the long-legged young man”—who had charge of his box for conveyance to the Dover coach-office—to stop for a minute while he (David) tied on the address. It will be remembered that poor David lost his box and his money on this occasion, when he started for Dover, “Taking very little more out of the world, towards the retreat of his aunt, Miss Betsy, than he had brought into it on the night when his arrival gave her so much umbrage;” the total sum of his remaining cash amounting to three half-pence.—See chapter 12. The first reference of our author to King’s Bench Prison will be found in “Nicholas Nickleby” (chapter 46), on the occasion of the hero’s first visit to _Madeline Bray_, who resided with her father in one “Of a row of mean and not over cleanly houses, situated within ‘the rules’ of the King’s Bench Prison; . . . comprising some dozen streets in which debtors who could raise money to pay large fees—from which their creditors did not derive any benefit—were permitted to reside.” We learn from Allen’s “History of Surrey” that these rules comprehended all St. George’s Fields, one side of Blackman Street, and part of the Borough High Street, forming an area of about three miles in circumference. They could be purchased by the prisoners at the rate of five guineas for small debts, eight guineas for the first hundred pounds of debt, and about half that sum for every subsequent hundred. The site of the prison is now occupied by workmen’s model dwellings named “Queen’s Buildings,” divided, north and south, by Scovell’s Road. At the opposite side (east) of _Newington Causeway_, which here commences, is _Union Road_, late _Horsemonger __Lane_; a short distance down which, on its south side, is “THE PUBLIC PLAYGROUND FOR CHILDREN,” formerly the site of Horsemonger Lane Gaol, erected at the back of the Surrey Sessions House. Here the execution of the Mannings took place, November 13th, 1849, on which occasion Charles Dickens was present. The same day he sent a notable letter to the _Times_, directing general attention to the demoralising effect of such public exhibitions; thus setting on foot an agitation which shortly resulted in the adoption of our present private mode of carrying out the last penalty of the law. After giving a forcible and graphic picture of the night scenes enacted by the disorderly crowd in waiting, the letter was thus continued:—