- generation of character is a wholly serious matter. Indeed,
Reade waxes so wroth over the cruelty, mental and physical, practiced upon the hopeless victims that the satire itself is as scorching as Swift's, though of course of less clear a flame.
Yet the warden Hawes, chief culprit through main responsibility, is analyzed as after all irresponsible, on psychological and social grounds:[1]
"Barren of mental resources, too stupid to see, far less read,
the vast romance that lay all around him, every cell a volume;
too mindless to comprehend his own grand situation on a salient
of the State and of human nature, and to discern the sacred and
endless pleasures to be gathered there, this unhappy dolt, flung
into a lofty situation by shallow blockheads, who, like himself,
saw in a jail nothing greater or more than a 'place of punishment,'
must still like his prisoners and the rest of us have some
excitement to keep him from going dead. * * * Growth
is the nature * * * even of an unnatural habit. * * *
Torture had grown upon stupid, earnest Hawes; it seasoned that
white of egg, a mindless existence."
The satisfaction one has in seeing him finally routed and
dismissed is enhanced by the manner of his exit. He
is given permission to collect his belongings before departure:—[2]
"'I have nothing to take out of the jail, man,' replied Hawes
rudely, 'except'—and here he did a bit of pathos and dignity—'my
zeal for Her Majesty's service, and my integrity.'
"'Ah,' replied Mr. Lacy, quietly, 'You won't want any help to carry them.'"
Next in order comes the "Visiting Injustice," a purblind
creature, who sees only what the warden points out
