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his pet subject of prison reform for our state - the segregation of the young then from the hardened criminals, if possible by building a reformatory, or if this is impossible, making certain changes at Lancaster that would facilitate the complete separation of the two classes. He was very anxious to carry this out, and did more to promote segregation than any other warden ever did. I wish to stop here and inform my reader of late one night in December when the warden had finished dictating to me his report.

I suggested to him that he permit me to send a carbon copy of the report to the governor elect at Falls City. I said, "I sincerely hope that the new governor will take interest in three of your recommendations, namely, the segregation of the boys, the severe laws against smuggling dope into the prison and the proper equipment of the outgoing inmate." While Governor Morehead never favored me with an acknowledgement of this copy, I was pleased to read of

 

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him incorporating all three of the warden's suggestions in his message to the legislature. Since then the legislature has passed a law making it a felony to smuggle "dope" into the prisons, and has appropriated money for the new reformatory; but I am very sorry that while they passed a law to equip the discharged convict properly when he leaves, and to pay him a part of the money that he earns in the pen, they forgot to appropriate the funds for this purpose, and the boys will continue for two years to go out in the world in the cheap suits that brand them everywhere as ex-convicts, and with only a five-dollar bill for a new start in life.

To Senator Dodge of Omaha, the boys are much obliged for the passing of these bills. The senator is a fine man, a leader among men, a man who did much good and one who took the interests of the prison more to heart than any member of the senate. The boys in gray admire and love Senator Dodge for his good work and there are some who

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would fight for him, were it necessary. How different the business of our great state would be conducted if all communities elected senators and representatives who took an interest in their work like this senator.

I went to the state house, and placed before each member of the legislature, the warden's report. I had a long talk with many of them, and all were more or less interested in the big prison. Most cordial of them all was Senator Dodge, and I was surprised to learn how much he knew of conditions at the pen. I was equally surprised at one of the representatives, or I should have said "misrepresentatives," of Lancaster County, who, when I placed the report upon his desk, promptly threw it into the waste basket. He was evidently too busy to look at it, for he had his feet on his desk and was enjoying a cigar. Now I will leave it to the reader's judgment, which is the best - to expend a reasonable amount on the boys discharged

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at Lancaster and have them start out right, or to turn them out in the winter without even an overcoat and with only five dollars? Is it a wonder that some of these boys return? Had they been properly equipped, they would perhaps never have come in contact with the law again.

To return to the boys, I must tell my reader why these men are at Lancaster, for every day I am asked, "But what did all these men do to come here?" The answer is:" Some do one thing and some another." During the last two years, there were received four hundred and fifty. Their crimes were as follows: burglary about one hundred and ten, larceny about fifty-five, larceny from person about one hundred and thirty, horse stealing thirty-five, rape about thirty, murder thirty-five, forgery fifty-five, safeblowing six, robbery twenty-five, wife desertion three, carrying concealed weapons one, playing poker three, chicken stealing one, cattle stealing nine, and the remainder