to sit side by side with me in the prison, and
to talk and discuss without any interference
from officers or anyone else ! I was kept waiting
till he came in from walking exercise, looking fresh and jolly.
We talked away for a fairly long time, and only when we wished to ask questions did anyone speak to us. The prisoner, who had been charged with entering Russia without permission, and with having bribed an official, was sentenced to detention until Peace was signed. There was no such thing as vengeance or even punishment in his treatment. He was allowed to study three different languages. Had he chosen he would have been engaged as an English tutor to teach English, which most of the people in authority desire to learn. By giving his parole not to attempt to escape he would have been allowed freedom to go where he pleased in the prison.
I contrasted this treatment with the treatment dealt out to political and other prisoners in this country, and especially with the treatment given to suffragettes and Irish prisoners, to the C.O.’s and the aliens charged or suspected of offences during the war, and the many thousands of aliens interned for no offence at all except that accidentally they were born outside England. In the midst of the Suffrage agitation one of my boys was sent to prison for breaking a window—a very
