THEN AND NOW

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 116, 9 February 1929, Page 22

THEN AND NOW

CRUELTY GIVES WAY TO .HUMANENESS A PRISON GARDEN ~■■ r - (By H.E.) The old man stood pointing to the partly-uncovered flagstone that had once formed part of the convict prison erected on this spot. The half century intervening had covered the stones, and the prison site had become a garden. Nothing remained but a few of the flagstones of that terrible place. The old man had been a convict, seven years transportation for a petty theft. His back bore the scars of the “cat o’ nine tails.” “I have seen,” he said, “fifty men flogged on one morning in that yard.* I have seen eleven men hanged in that yard on the same, morning for attempted mutiny." The place and the man carried the mind irresistibly to the horrors of the prison system of a century ago, with-its tyrannical discipline and brutality. ‘ A visit to the Wi Tako prison provided a pleasant contrast to that other prison, There were none of the con comltants which made the old prisons places of grey gloom and hopelessness. It was a beautiful day—a Sunday. The inmates were at leisure in the yard. The grass was smoothly shorn and brilliantly green. Flower-beds were bright with colour. „ In the centre of the square a set of wash-basins, faucets highly-polished, scrupulously <flean, set under a roof of attractive design. The 'men stood or sat to chat, some strolled along the gravel paths, two were playing, draughts. They were clean, healthylooking men, . in surroundings more pleasant perhaps than the homes from which some of them came. A visit to the . cells, the kitchen, the sick bay, enlarged the impression created by the first view of the yard—a modern prison conducted In a spirit of humanity. The flagstones, the triangles, and the gallows had given place to flowers,'modest comfort arid restrained: discipline. .

. It was the prison garden, which marked the wide contrast, the essential difference betwe.en the old and the-new systems. It was not the official garden but a garden that the men them'selves had created. After the work of the day is done and the evening meal served, a . certain number of -men’ are allowed freedom. .This period ,they have choken to spend in transforming a. hillside into a charming garden. The beds are set out with taste and, the flowering borders are strikingly effective. Part of the area is devoted to vegetables which, when grown; are the property of the men. Peas, beans, onions and tomatoes flourished. . The potato patch might excite the envy -of any gardener. The area of native bush has been penetrated, by paths where, under the shade of luxuriant ferns, are set tables and seats —an arbour of beauty that would grace any garden, however elegant. The tables and seats, constructed of bush timber, are artistic and serviceable. The path winds up the hill to the foot of a giant punga and there is set’a beautiful memorial to the late chaplin of the prison, the late Bev. Mr. Holmes^—a memorial inspired, designed and executed by the men themselves in appreciation of a good man’s ministrations. Is there another memorial to a prison chaplain in the Dominion? The Wi Tako prison site has been transformed by the labour of men from a useless waterlogged area into a highproductive farm. The prison itself has been constructed to serve its purpose without the grimness of the older type of penitentiary but the crowning characteristics of the whole,is-the men’s prison garden. The unreasoning barbarity of the past has given place to a reasoning humanitarianism in the treatment of the men who, from' one cause and another, come within the condemnation of the law. We may not have progressed far along trie road of understanding crime and the criminal, or in the methods to be employed to convert him from anti-social lawlessness but, at least, the authorities at Wi Tako are making creative work a means ( to accomplish that desirable end.