Indiana has done wonders with prison labor along agricultural lines, having established one large Industrial Farm for misdemeanants. In addition, the State is utilizing its prisoners to a considerable extent to relieve the scarcity of farm labor caused by the war. About 100 convicts built sidings to coal mines to get out fuel for the war. At the time of a disastrous flood they worked day and night, without guards, saving by their efforts thousands of dollars worth of private property. They were also successfully used at the time of a severe tornado, recovering the lost, and clearing away the debris. Indiana does not favor the use of prison labor on public roads. North Carolina is working 500 prisoners on State owned farms with excellent success, and in addition is helping out the farmers to some extent. The State also employs about 100 men on the highways, but believes road work by prison labor is good for the roads but bad for the men. New York thinks that every available prisoner should be employed, but because of constitutional limitation cannot use its convicts on private farms. Practically every penitentiary and county jail in the State is employing its prisoners either at gardening or farm work on State or county owned or leased farms. Food production has been materially increased by these concerted efforts towards agricultural products, and the prisoners themselves are benefited by the outdoor work. Prison labor is also extensively used on the public roads. A notable example of the successful employment of agricultural prison labor, that is coming into more than local prominence, is in our own State of Pennsylvania, where Warden Francies is working wonders with his advanced methods at the new penitentiary at Bellefonte. WASHINGTON, PA., August 7, 1918. THE FINANCIAL ARGUMENT FOR A COUNTY PRISON FARM. It will be generally granted that useful employment in the open air will be beneficial, but let us also consider the financial side of the proposition. It will be remembered that the General Assembly of 1917 passed a bill providing for the establishment of nine Industrial Farms, to which convicts usually sent to the county jails may be sent for discipline and employment. I am indebted to Mr. Harry J. Campbell, of Washington, Pa., for some statistics from nine counties in the southwestern part of the Commonwealth, constituting one of the Districts in which an Industrial Prison was to be located. In order to determine whether such a Prison Farm would be remunerative, Mr. Campbell collected the statistics from these nine counties which afford fairly conclusive proof of the economy of the proposition. These nine counties in 1917 sent:--