What is said is quite true.

A child is utterly contaminated by prison life.

But this contaminating influence is not that of the prisoners.

It is that of the whole prison system--of the governor, the chaplain, the warders, the solitary cell, the isolation, the revolting food, the rules of the Prison Commissioners, the mode of discipline, as it is termed, of the life.
"Of course no child under fourteen years of age should be sent to prison at all.

It is an absurdity, and, like many absurdities, of absolutely tragical results...." This letter, I am informed, brought about some improvement in the treatment of young children in British prisons.