The County Prison presents a vast field for contemplation and labor. It is the receptacle of the vagrant, the drunkard, the disorderly, the suspected, and the convicted. All the elements of crime are found in its cells, and sometimes the unfortunate, the oppressed, and the innocent are made more miserable by a forced association with the vicious and the guilty. Sometimes an accidental association with the bad has procured for the careless, well-meaning innocent, a companion that has indoctrinated him with vice, and made him a proficient in crime. All degrees of servitude are experienced in this prison, from that which terminates with the twenty-four hours for intoxication, to that which is extended to years for some flagrant violation of the law. Nay, there are those who, in the midst of years, have no hope of escaping from the prison cells till they shall “be carried forth of men,” to be buried under the rules of the prison, or by the charity of those who knew them in better days. These last are men convicted of willful murder, by a jury, and sentenced to death, by the Court, but in whose behalf some circumstance suggests a withholding of the death-warrant, and their cases remain from one term of gubernatorial office to another, transmitted by the ruling chief magistrate to his successor, among the matters unfinished, but which seem not to impose upon the new governor the necessity of discharging the painful office which was avoided by his predecessor. The occupants of the County Prison cells are of the following kind:— _The First Class._—Those committed for vagrancy, breach of the peace, drunkenness, and disorderly conduct. _Second Class._—Persons charged with violation of the laws, whose cases are to be decided by the Criminal Court. _Third Class._—Persons sentenced to short imprisonment, and the payment of fines and costs. _Fourth Class._—Those convicted of crimes of a high character, and sentenced to confinement and labor. And we may add a _Fifth Class._—Formed of those already mentioned, who, having been sentenced to death by the Court, are yet detained in prison by the withholding of the death-warrant for their Execution, or of the pardon which would ensure their release.