The construction of this gaol was very simple. A strong, low, oblong building had been erected on a foundation so filled in with stones as to render digging nearly impossible. The floors were of large, massive stones, that ran across the whole building a distance of some thirty feet, or if there were joints, they were under the partition walls, rendering them as secure as if solid. The cells were not large, certainly, but of sufficient size to admit of light and air. The ceilings were of the same enormous flat stones as the floors, well secured by a load of stones, and beams to brace them, and the partitions were of solid masonry. There the prisoner is encased in stone, and nothing can be more hopeless than an attempt to get out of one of these cells, provided the gaoler gives even ordinary attention to their condition. Above and around them are erected the outer walls of the gaol. The last comprise an ordinary stone house, with roof, windows, and the other customary appliances of a human abode. As these walls stand several feet without those of the real prison, and are somewhat higher, the latter axe an _imperium in imperio_; a house within a house. The space between the walls of the two buildings forms a gallery extending around all the cells. Iron grated gates divide the several parts of this gallery into so many compartments, and in the gaol of Biberry care has been had so to arrange these subdivisions that those within any one compartment may be concealed from those in all of the others, but the two that immediately join it. The breezes are admitted by means of the external windows, while the height of the ceiling in the galleries, and the space above the tops of the cells, contribute largely to comfort and health in this important particular. As the doors of the cells stand opposite to the windows, the entire gaol can be, and usually is, made airy and light. Stoves in the galleries preserve the temperature, and effectually remove all disagreeable moisture. In a word, the place is as neat, convenient, and decent as the gaol of convicts need ever to be; but the proper sort of distinction is not attended to between them and those who are merely accused. Our civilization in this respect is defective. While the land is filled with senseless cries against an aristocracy which, if it exist at all, exists in the singular predicament of being far less favoured than the democracy, involving a contradiction in terms; against a feudality that consists in men’s having bargained to pay their debts in chickens, no one complaining in behalf of those who have entered into contracts to do the same in wheat; and against _rent_, while _usury_ is not only smiled on, but encouraged, and efforts are made to legalize extortion; the public mind is quiet on the subject of the treatment of those whom the policy of government demands should be kept in security until their guilt or innocence be established. What reparation, under such circumstances, can be made to