always brought up when an application is made for a pardon. The Reporter of characters takes a full share of gratification in adverting to these, when a certificate of the conduct is given. I cannot mention this man's conduct without indignation. I hope he will find room for repentance, and obtain pardon from his God for his many vexatious acts in relation to the prisoners. I know of no man in whose breast so little humanity prevails. Every prisoner will carry to judgment a charge against him. One drop of human sympathy never flowed in his veins. A mountain of ice has frozen around his heart. His acts of inhumanity would fill volumes, and it would require years to record them. I pity him from my soul, and though I have felt more than once, the weight of his mercy, I freely pardon him. If he should ever look on this page, I hope he will remember how unjustly he abused me, because he had the power, and I could not help myself. I wish also that he would think of Plumley, and the three times convicted sufferer of Woodstock Green.

Besides those already mentioned, it may not be out of place to touch on a few of what may be called extra judicial inflictions, or those which are felt by the prisoners without the usual process of a "report in writing." These are—not sending their letters, nor admitting those sent to them—adding a yard to the task of a man, who did not feel like doing more than was required of him, and making him use the finest and most difficult materials—imposing the worst work, and allowing only the poorest tools. These, and many other vexatious practices, are as common as the return of day and night; so that the prison at Windsor is one of those gloomy and dreadful places, which image to the mind that house of woe and pain, where are weeping and wailing, and gnashing of teeth; where the worm dieth not and the fire is not quenched; and into which the wicked will be turned, and all the nations that forget God.

That the reader may have a full view of this subject, I shall give in the next chapter a multitude of cases, which will fully illustrate this very important and affecting part of my sketches.

SAMUEL E. GODFREY.

The case of Samuel E. Godfrey is one of deep and thrilling interest to every feeling heart. It is one of those numerous cases which stain the records of humanity, in which the guilt of a criminal is extenuated by the circumstances of its existence, and lost in the intensity of his sufferings. The fertile regions of Fancy cannot produce a theme more fruitful in incidents, and more painful in its melancholy details. It presents to our minds two principal sufferers, one pure and stainless as the mountain snow—a forlorn and destitute female; religion warming her crimeless heart, and virtue sparkling in her tearful eyes, she deserted not, in the hour of his afflictions, the companion of her better days, but hung, like an angel of mercy, on the bosom of his grief, and shared in every pang of his soul. The other claims not our sympathies as for an innocent sufferer, for crime had been on his hands, and guilt had made its stains on his heart. I do him no injustice by this statement; but I should stain my own conscience were I not to add, that he was a criminal by aggravation, and that had others acted more in accordance with the dictates of either religion or moral honesty, he would not have reddened his hands with the blood of his fellow-man, nor ended his days on a gallows.

In rescuing the history of this unfortunate sufferer from the grave of oblivion, I have but one motive, and this is, to do good. It contains volumes of instruction, and much of this is needed at the present day. Societies are formed and forming, with a view to improve the condition of suffering criminals by such a change in the discipline of prisons, as may conduce to their reformation; and these societies have a right to such information, as may enable them to act intelligently and efficiently. I also desire by this piece of history, to hold up the yet unpunished authors of the most unearthly sufferings, to the indignant scorn and righteous reprobation of all mankind. It is too often the case that the crimes of men in authority are sanctified by the duties of their office, and they screened from the arm of the law and the force of public contempt, by the necessity of the case. But the time has come to vindicate the sacred purity of public stations from this charge, by taking the robe from every unworthy incumbent, and inculcating the sentiment, both by precept and by practice, that there is no sanctuary for crime, and no justification for guilt.

With the history of Godfrey previous to the unhappy event which conducted him to the scaffold, I have nothing to do. At this time he was confined in the prison on a sentence of three years for a petty crime committed in Burlington near the close of the war. He had served about half of this term, and his conduct had been such as to justify an expectation of pardon, an application for which was pending before the executive, when the gloomy event transpired which sealed his dreadful doom. His wife, one of the most amiable of women, had gone to lay his petition before the Governor and Council, and plead the cause of her husband. Hope was beginning to play around the darkness of his cell, and the anticipations of liberty were beginning to inspire his breast. His arms were almost thrown out to embrace the companion of his bosom and the friends of his heart. In the ear of fancy he heard the voice of his keeper saying—"Godfrey, you are free!" At this moment, by a sudden turn in the scale of his destiny, all the future was darkened, and the taper of life began to grow dim with despair. Driven to desperation by the unjust and cruel treatment of a petty officer of the prison, he committed the fatal deed, which gave rise to that train of sufferings, and developed those traits of unfeeling cruelty in his persecutors, which I am going to describe; and which terminated his mortal existence on the gallows.

His employment was weaving; a given number of yards each day was his task. At the time under consideration, he took what he had woven and handed it over to his keeper, and as usual, he was found to have done his task, and performed as much labor as was required of any of the prisoners, and to have done his work well. While he was conversing with the keeper on the subject of his labor he remarked that he had done more than he meant to.—This gave offence, and he immediately corrected the expression, and gave, as what he designed to say, that he had wove more than he thought he had. But this did not give satisfaction; and the master weaver coming up at the time, a consultation was held with him by the keeper, which resulted in a complaint against Godfrey to the Warden, for "insolence." This complaint was made by the advice of the master weaver, who wrote it with his own hand, as he acknowledges in his testimony before the court. "I advised Mr. Rodgers to report him, and wrote the report." These are his own words, and as a reason for his conduct, he further says; "I had understood that there was a combination among the prisoners not to weave over a certain quantity."

Such was the crime alleged in the complaint, which I desire to have noticed very particularly. It was not that he had not performed his full task. It was not that his work was not well done. But it was that he said—"I have done more than I meant to," which he immediately softened by saying—"I mean I have done more than I thought I had." And when I shall have informed you what the consequence of such a complaint was, what the punishment it procured, you will be able to appreciate the character of those who entered the