NEW ZEALAND PRISONS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1319, 24 September 1880, Page 2

NEW ZEALAND PRISONS.

The question of the appointment of an official to revise and reorganise, the prison system of New Zealand,ww h iC h has been long under the consideration 0 f Sir Julius Vogel, has (says the Home News) been finally settled. Sir Juiins Vogel, anxious to secure the best nana for his Government, threw the appointment open to general competition,.and was overwhelmed, as might have been expected, with applications frosn all manner of men. Somewhat diffident of his own powers of selection, Sir Julius wisely consulted the head of the Prison Department in this country, Sir EdmundDucane. There is every probability that the vacancy will be filled by a. thoroughly competent man. It has beon offered to,.and will no doubt be accepted byCaptain Hume, late of the 79th Highlanders, who has been for some years past in the Prison Department. He began his. service at Millbank, one of the oldest, a® it is one of the largest prisons in the* metropolis ; thence he went to Dartmoor as deputy-Governor, where he had tho Tichborne claimant in custody. After that he passed to the great convict establishment at Portland, and lately he lias been at the head of the great prison works, in progress at Wormwood Scrubbs. Experience such as his cannot fail to boi useful to the colony he is to serve, especially that which he has most recently gained l . The prison at Wormwood Scrnbbsi is th® very latest model of its kind, anditt has been constructed entirely by prison labor at a minimum of cost. If the Now Zealand Government have it in contemplation to rebuild its prisons, Captain. Hume will be just the man to supervise! the execution of the work.