This message from my pen is not a work on criminology or penology. No gathering of statistics, nor comparative study of the works or theories of learned authorities on these subjects will be found within its pages. It is just a plea from the heart of one who knows them, for those who cannot voice to the world their own thoughts and feelings. We ask no sentimental sympathy or pity, no patronage or charity, but only understanding, justice, and fair play.

My point of view is that of the cell. All I know of this great sad problem that casts its shadow so much further than the high walls of prison I have learned from those for whom I work, and my great joy in every labor is the knowledge that "the boys" are with me. In speaking of them thus I do so in prison parlance; for just as Masons on the floor call each other "Brothers"; soldiers in camp "Comrades"; men in college "Fellows"; so we of the prison use the term "The Boys," and leave unspoken that hated word "Convict," which seems to vibrate with the sound of clanging chains and shuffling lock-step.

If I do not write of others, who, during the past century, have worked in prison reform, it is not that I have disregarded their efforts, but as this is a record of what I have personally seen and learned, space and time will not permit the recording of experiences which can doubtless be read elsewhere.

In sending forth these pages of personal experience I pray that they may stir the hearts of the free, the happy, and the fortunate throughout our dear country, that they, in their turn, may champion the cause of those who cannot fight their own battle, giving to them the practical help that they so sorely need.