"O, yes! they think they're prison birds, and there's nothing more for 'em in this world, and they don't care. Nobody likes to have such as we about 'em." "But there are people that would help you to lead a better life, and earn an honest living, if you could find them." "They might find us, but it is hard for us to find them." That was a very true remark. Our prisons are prominent institutions in the land. It is easy for any one who is interested in the cause of humanity to find them; but to get access to them is a more difficult undertaking, as many can testify who have attempted it. I leave them to tell their own tale, and let it bear its own testimony. It is easy to find the poor wretches who are compelled to take up their abode within them, and do them good if one wills. What a page of life was revealed to me in that one day! What a work is there here for you to do, O women of this broad land, for your fellow woman, if you will address yourselves to it! XIV. INSPECTION OF PRIVATE APARTMENTS. It required the exercise of a large share of physical courage to enter, and examine into the condition of the private apartments of my boarders. I shrank away from the task in loathing. Low, narrow, confined, they were like the cages of wild animals. The human odor of the occupants had penetrated the walls and made the air noisome. They were ventilated through the bars of the door, and an aperture of five or six inches in diameter in the inner wall of the cell; but being used for all purposes, they would have remained uncleansed had every care been taken. I went to the door of one, and looked in. I shivered, dreaded to enter, turned away. I went along to another. It looked comparatively tidy. A little white cloth embroidered around the edge with gay-colored thread, was laid carefully over the box. I stood and looked in while I reasoned with myself to screw my courage to the sticking point. I put my head within the door, the bugs were crawling along the walls, and the white-wash was spotted with marks of the violent death which had befallen many of them the night before. Again I shrank back in disgust. I called the white-wash woman to come with her brush and cover up the filthy sight, if she could not cleanse the dirt away. If the sight is so revolting, what must it be to sleep among them, to be lodged with, and fed upon by them. I worked up my feelings of pity for the poor prisoners till my disgust was partially overcome. The rats and mice can come in at the open doors, and there is no obstacle to such ingress of bed-bugs. Indeed such armies of them as I beheld could hardly have made their entrance in any other way. There they were in swarms, and had planted their colonies upon the solid brick and mortar, granite and iron, industriously, as the busy bee prepares her dormitory.