That night, when I went into the hospital, for the closing inspection, the nurse was grumbling about the trouble one of the women had given her. "Indeed, ma'am, this is the awfullest place a woman can get into!" I thought I would give her a hint that it was her own misdoings that brought her there. "What brought you in here, Mary?" I asked. "I made my fingers too nimble with a man's pocket-book." "You did! then you don't deserve a very good place, do you?" "I have got my pay for it." "How came you to do such a thing?" "He left some money with me to keep, and I did keep it so as he couldn't get it again. He got drunk, and I thought perhaps he wouldn't remember it again." "Men don't forget their money so easily." "So I found to my cost." "What did you do with the money?" "I spent it for things that I wanted." "You will hardly try that again if you ever have the chance." "No, ma'am! I could have earned the two hundred and eighty dollars that I took in half the time I have been here, and had my liberty too." "You knew it was wrong when you took the money and used it?" "Yes, ma'am; but I wanted the things, and the money was in my hand to buy 'em. The things would be of use; and I knew that drunken fellow would waste it if he had it." Another specimen of specious reasoning; nor is that kind of reasoning confined to convicts. "It was not yours; you had no right to it, and that ought to have been sufficient for you. If he wasted it in drunkenness that was his sin, not yours. You could have restrained him through the laws that punish drunkenness. You could have told him how wrong he was doing, and set him a better example. Instead of that you stole, and he got drunk. You made yourself as bad as he." "I did not think of that." "I hope this has taught you a lesson that you will never forget,--one that will make you think. Before you had this punishment you had not the strength to resist the temptation to take the money. Now you will always remember what you have suffered here, and you will not be likely to do it again." "No, ma'am, I don't think I shall. This is harder than working for a living outside, besides the rough handling we get. A poor living at that, and poorer clothes. And you officers don't fare much better. You get a little better feed, and a better bed, and a little pay; but not so much rest; and you are in as close confinement as we are." "But we are not prisoners; we can go if we like." "What do you stay here for; you don't seem fit for such work, and you might earn a great deal more outside, and not work so hard?" "I may be able to teach a few of you, poor things, to live right when you go outside, and that will be better to me than money." "God bless you! that is what we want. There is many a one of us would be glad to live right if we knew how." "There are some that only grow harder for coming here, and do as bad again, and come back."