Produced by Eric Eldred, Beth Trapaga, Charles Franks and
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In the cell over mine at night
A step goes to and fro
From barred door to iron wall—
From wall to door I hear it go,
Four paces, heavy and slow,
In the heart of the sleeping jail:
And the goad that drives, I know!
I never saw his face or heard him speak;
He may be Dutchman, Dago, Yankee, Greek;
But the language of that prisoned step
Too well I know!
Unknown brother of the remorseless bars,
Pent in your cage from earth and sky and stars,
The hunger for lost life that goads you so,
I also know!
Hour by hour, in the cell overhead,
Four footfalls, to and fro
'Twixt iron wall and barred door—
Back and forth I hear them go—
Four footfalls come and go!
I wake and listen in the night:
Brother, I know!
(Written in Atlanta Penitentiary,
May, 1913.)
By JULIAN HAWTHORNE
These chapters were begun the day after I got back to New York from theAtlanta penitentiary, and went on from day to day to the end. I did notknow, at the start, what the thing would be like at the finish, and I madesmall effort to make it look shapely and smooth; but the inward impulse inme to write it, somehow, was irresistible, in spite of the other impulseto go off somewhere and rest and forget it all. But I felt that if it werenot done then it might never be done at all; and done it must be at anycost. I had promised my mates in prison that I would do it, and I wasunder no less an obligation, though an unspoken one, to give the public anopportunity to learn at first hand what prison life is, and means. I hadmyself had no conception of the facts and their significance until Ibecame myself a prisoner, though I had read as much in "prison literature"as most people, perhaps, and had for many years thought on the subject ofpenal imprisonment. Twenty odd years before, too, I had been struck byWilliam Stead's saying, "Until a man has been in jail, he doesn't knowwhat human life means." But one does not pay that price for knowledgevoluntarily, and I had not expected to have the payment forced upon me. Iimagined I could understand the feelings of a prisoner without being one.I was to live to acknowledge myself mistaken. And I conceive that otherpeople are in the same deceived condition. So, with all the energy andgoodwill of which I am capable, I set myself to do what I could to makethem know the truth, and to ask themselves what should or could be done toend a situation so degrading to every one concerned in it, from one end ofthe line to the other. The situation, indeed, seems all but incredible.Your first thought on being told of it is, It must be an exaggeration or afabrication. On the contrary, words cannot convey the whole h