increased enormously."

"Yes, indeed," he assented; "under the Reform _régime_, which began in
your day, crime became so powerful, bold and fierce that arrests were no
longer possible and the prisons then in existence were soon overcrowded.
The state was compelled to erect others of greater capacity."

"But, Colonel," I protested, "if the criminals were too bold and
powerful to be taken into custody, of what use are the prisons? And how
are they crowded?"

He fixed upon me a look that I could not fail to interpret as expressing
a doubt of my sanity. "What!" he said, "is it possible that the modern
penology is unknown to you? Do you suppose we practice the antiquated
and ineffective method of shutting up the rascals? Sir, the growth of
the criminal element has, as I said, compelled the erection of more and
larger prisons. We have enough to hold comfortably all the honest men
and women of the state. Within these protecting walls they carry on all
the necessary vocations of life excepting commerce. That is necessarily
in the hands of the rogues, as before."

"Venerated representative of Reform," I exclaimed, wringing his hand
with effusion, "you are Knowledge, you are History, you are the Higher
Education! We must talk further. Come, let us enter this benign edifice;
you shall show me your dominion and instruct me in the rules. You shall
propose me as an inmate."

I walked rapidly to the gate. When challenged by the sentinel, I turned
to summon my instructor. He was nowhere visible. I turned again to look
at the prison. Nothing was there: desolate and forbidding, as about the