atrocities exercised by those who had authority over its unfortunate inmates. The person, to whose active humanity was owing the exposure and mitigation of this fearful grievance, was General Oglethorpe, the fellow-soldier of Prince Eugene in his campaigns against the Turks, and the friend of Pope and Dr. Johnson.

Driven by strong benevolence of soul,

Shall fly, like Oglethorpe, from pole to pole.

General Oglethorpe, whose philanthropic exertions in founding the colony of Georgia had already obtained immortality for him in the verse of Pope, happened to pay a visit to a friend of the name of Castell, an architect and author of a translation of Vitruvius,—who was a prisoner in the Fleet. From the lips of this person he learned the system of cruelty and oppression which was practised by the Warden and his myrmidons; and accordingly, from his place in the House of Commons, he moved for, and obtained, the appointment of a Committee, to investigate the state of the prisons throughout the kingdom; he himself being appointed its chairman. The first gaol which they visited was the Fleet. The names of the Warden and Deputywarden were John Huggins and Thomas Bainbridge, persons apparently of respectable birth and education. The most infamous extortions; cruel and arbitrary punishments; notorious breaches of trust; cases in which debtors had been permitted to escape; others in which they had been unlawfully loaded with irons and thrust into dungeons, were

clearly brought home to these persons by the Committee.

One of the most striking features in this affair, was the contempt with which the Committee, in the first instance, appear to have been treated by the functionaries of the prison. Their first visit was paid on the 27th of February 1729, when, among other prisoners whom they examined, was Sir William Rich, a baronet, whom they found immured in one of the dungeons, loaded with irons. He was instantly set at liberty by order of the Committee, but no sooner had they quitted the prison, than Bainbridge, the Deputy-warden, sent him back to his miserable quarters. But a still more remarkable instance was that of Castell, the friend of the Chairman, General Oglethorpe. Being unable to meet an extortionate demand which had been made on him, in the shape of a fee, he was ordered to be removed from his apartment, which was in an airy part of the prison, to a quarter in which the small-pox was frightfully raging. Having a nervous horror of this distemper, he entreated, in a passion of grief, that he might be allowed to remain in his present apartments, insisting that, in the event of his removal, he was satisfied that he should catch the distemper and die. His words proved prophetic. He was removed, was locked up in his miserable apartment, sickened, and died.

The tyranny and tortures, indeed, practised in the Fleet Prison scarcely more than a century ago, almost exceed belief. The case of an unfortunate

Portuguese, Jacob Mendez Solas, or rather the sufferings which he endured at the hands of the inhuman Bainbridge,—are especially dwelt upon by the Committee; in the words of whose report we will relate his story. "The said Bainbridge one day called him into the gate-house of the prison, called the Lodge, where he caused him to be seized, fettered, and carried to Corbell's, the sponginghouse, and there kept for upwards of a week. When brought back into the prison, Bainbridge caused him to be turned into the dungeon, called the Strong Room, on the master's side. This place is a vault like those in which the dead are interred, and wherein the bodies of persons dying in the same prison are usually deposited, till the coroner's inquest is passed upon them. It has no chimney or fire-place, nor any light but what comes over the door, or through a hole of about eight inches square. It is neither paved nor boarded, and the rough bricks appear both on the sides and top, being neither wainscoted nor plastered. What adds to the dampness and stench of the place is, its being built over the common sewer, and adjoining to the sink and dunghill, where all the filth of the prison is cast. In this miserable place, the poor wretch was kept by Bainbridge, manacled and shackled, for near two months." We have the authority of the Committee, that after the release of Solas from his dungeon, when the probability of Bainbridge returning as Warden of the Fleet was incidentally mentioned to him, he fainted

away, and the blood started out of his nose and mouth.

In this case, as in that of a Captain John McPhedris, the only offence. appears to have been an inability to meet the extortionate demands, in the shape of fees, which were made by the authorities of the Fleet. The case of McPhedris was even more cruel than that of Solas. Having been dragged from the apartment of another prisoner, in which he had taken refuge, he was thrust, in spite of his entreaties, into one of the dungeons of the prison. In vain did he implore to be carried before a magistrate, insisting that if he had committed any offence, he was willing to be judged and punished by the laws. To his complaints that his fetters were too small for him, and caused him intolerable torture, Bainbridge coolly replied that they had been selected with that express intention; and when the unfortunate man remonstrated that torture was forbidden by the laws of England ;"Never mind," he said; "I will do it first, and answer for it afterwards." We are informed that the dungeon into which he was thrown was without a bed; and that his legs became so severely lacerated by the irons, that symptoms of mortification actually presented themselves. When, at the expiration of three weeks, he was liberated from his miserable dungeon, he was not only incurably lame, but, according to the report of the Committee, his eye-sight was so much injured, that he was in danger of losing it altogether.

VOL. II.

S

Another instance of the exercise of unlawful and despotic power was reported by the Committee in the case of one Thomas Hogg. This person had on a former occasion been a prisoner in the Fleet for about three years. He had, however, been regularly discharged, and some time afterwards was passing by the Fleet, when he paused to bestow a small sum in charity on the prisoners at the grating. This simple act of kindness appears to have given extraordinary offence to the authorities of the prison. Hogg was immediately seized by one of the turnkeys, named Barnes, and, by order of Bainbridge, was forcibly detained as a prisoner. When the Committee visited the Fleet, this person had actually continued in confinement upwards of nine months, without any ostensible cause or legal authority whatever.

We must remember that these extraordinary facts are derived, not from the common hearsay or gossip of the period, but from a grave official report presented to the House of Commons by their own Committee. The House was unanimous in their opinion as to the steps which ought to be adopted. It was voted that the charges of extortion and breach of trust had been clearly brought home to the officers of the prison; and, moreover, that they had barbarously, cruelly, and illegally ill-treated those committed to their charge, in gross violation and contempt of the laws of the land. Huggins, the late Warden, and Bainbridge, the Deputy Warden, were committed close prisoners to Newgate, toge