“In regard to the third period of probation, however, with a ticket-of-leave, the following conditions were promulgated:—‘The holder of a ticket-of-leave will be required to remain within a certain district; he will not be released from the custody of the Government until engaged to serve an employer for twelve months; he will then be placed under the supervision of the police, will be required to register his place of abode, and periodically report himself to the police,’ &c. Pentonville and Portland afford the fullest means of judging of the system of discipline and the results of the two periods which were to be enforced in this country. The commissioners of the former prison, after anxiously watching the moral effects of the great experiment conducted for five years under their superintendence, thus recorded the conclusion at which they had arrived, in a report dated in 1847:—‘We feel warranted in expressing our firm conviction, that the moral results of the discipline have been most encouraging, and attended with a success which, we believe, is without parallel in the history of penal discipline.’ “With respect to Portland, Captain Whitty, in his report for 1850, after stating his conviction that the system of following up a period of separate confinement by associated labours, was working well, states:—‘The subdued, improved, and disciplined state in which the convicts generally arrive at Portland from the stage of separate confinement, appears to be an admirable preparation for their transfer to the greater degree of freedom unavoidable on public works.’ Captain Knight, who succeeded Captain Whitty as Governor, remarks in his report for 1851:—‘I have frequently watched the working parties from positions in which I could not have been seen by them, and I have seldom seen a greater amount of willingness or industry displayed by men whose livelihood depended upon their exertions.’ [I myself was a witness of the same degree of cheerful industry, in 1861.] It appears from the returns, that 400 men are at the present time quarrying and loading from the great ditch of the fortress about three tons a man, for which a contractor had previously received 1_s._ 5_d._ a ton. The net saving to the Government, after deducting 4_d._ for the cost of plant, would give 3_s._ 3_d._ a day as the net earnings of each man in the working parties; whilst the entire cost, exclusive of buildings, will not exceed 1_s._ 9_d._ a head. Were it not that a proportion of the convicts are detained at school, and employed as cooks, tailors, &c., the prison would be self-supporting; and had there been opportunity for the full development of convict labour, at least one-half of the usual cost of such works would have been saved.