Page 587 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

come out again alive.
May 16th.—A sub-overseer, a man named Hankey, has
been talking to me. He says that there are some forty of the
oldest and worst prisoners who form what he calls the ‘Ring’,
and that the members of this ‘Ring’ are bound by oath to
support each other, and to avenge the punishment of any
of their number. In proof of his assertions he instanced two
cases of English prisoners who had refused to join in some
crime, and had informed the Commandant of the proceed-
ings of the Ring. They were found in the morning strangled
in their hammocks. An inquiry was held, but not a man out
of the ninety in the ward would speak a word. I dread the
task that is before me. How can I attempt to preach piety
and morality to these men? How can I attempt even to save
the less villainous?
May 17th.—Visited the wards to-day, and returned in
despair. The condition of things is worse than I expected.
It is not to be written. The newly-arrived English prison-
ers—and some of their histories are most touching—are
insulted by the language and demeanour of the hardened
miscreants who are the refuse of Port Arthur and Cockatoo
Island. The vilest crimes are perpetrated as jests. These are
creatures who openly defy authority, whose language and
conduct is such as was never before seen or heard out of
Bedlam. There are men who are known to have murdered
their companions, and who boast of it. With these the Eng-
lish farm labourer, the riotous and ignorant mechanic, the
victim of perjury or mistake, are indiscriminately herded.
With them are mixed Chinamen from Hong Kong, the

For the Term of His Natural Life