into a true sense of their past sinfulness, that they may in condescending mercy, be yet brought, by repentance and amendment of life, to work out their soul’s salvation. There is a keeper to every division of about thirty prisoners, and these keepers are selected with special reference to their fitness, on the score of morals, temper and intelligence. None of the keepers, or other officers in the penitentiary, go armed in any way, there being no occasion for it, as it is morally certain that no revolt, or insubordination, threatening violence, can ever take place. Each prisoner is fully sensible that an effort to escape, must necessarily be unsuccessful, and therefore, he never broods over its possibility, nor devises plans to subdue his keeper, or even murder him, if need be, to effect it. On the contrary, the whole system is one of kindness, it might almost be said, between the prisoners, the keepers and the visitors. The prisoner, knowing he is powerless, becomes passive, and there being nothing to rouse his vindictive or other evil passions, he is soon brought, in his quiet retirement, to view his past life in a very different light from what he ever did before. And also, as the society of the bad, which he formerly coveted and enjoyed, is shut out from him, his craving for companionship, soon brings him to enjoy the company of the virtuous and good, which he formerly despised; and consequently, the instruction and counsel which is extended to him by his visitor, will meet with a reception and make an impression, which under other circumstances, we might look for in vain. And in the moment of contrition, when the poor outcast is brought to abhor himself, and would fain pour out his soul before God,—it may be in the presence of his visitor and religious instructor,—there is no hardened and depraved associate with him, to sneer at his supposed weakness and prompt him to reject the proffered mercy.