CHAPTER IV.

THE SECRET PRISON.

The _cárceles secretas_, or secret prison, was the official designation of the place of confinement during trial of those accused of heresy. It formed part of the building of the Inquisition, so that the prisoner could at any moment be brought into the audience-chamber without being exposed to public view--such a case as Carranza's, where confinement was in a different place and the inquisitors went there, being wholly exceptional. The secret prison was exclusively one of detention, the _casa de penitencia_, or punitive prison, being wholly different, and the contrast between the two--the laxity of the imprisonment as a punishment of the guilty and its rigor towards those whose guilt was yet uncertain--is not the least of the anomalies of the Holy Office.

As a general rule it may be said that imprisonment followed arrest and that admission to bail was an exceptional favor in the early time, virtually withdrawn afterwards. In 1530 we have an example in the case of Antonio de Parejo, a priest whose offences did not amount to formal heresy, who was released by the Toledo tribunal from the secret prison and given the city as a prison on bail in 100,000 maravedís, furnished by his brother Vizcaino, who renounced his fuero; Parejo moreover took a solemn oath not to leave Toledo on his own feet or on those of others, and that a certain Matheo Pérez could always tell where he was to be found.[1487] Various regulations, in 1535 and 1537, allow bail in cases where arrests had been made on slender evidence but, in 1560, Valdés ordered that no exceptions should be made when the charge was of heresy.[1488]

For those held on less serious charges there was less rigorous treatment. The inquisitorial jurisdiction extended over a wide range of offences, more or less trivial, and the tribunals did not care to be burdened with the expense of prisoners who were not likely to seek safety in flight or to warn their accomplices. For these there were various grades of confinement, under the practice known as _aplacería_, of assigning the city as a prison, or the offender's house, or the less rigorous prison for officials under trial, known as the _cárcel de familiares_. Thus, about 1640, a writer says that, in cases of blasphemy, the accused can be assigned the city as a prison or, if the offence has been especially shameless and scandalous and reiterated, it may be proper to confine him in the cárcel de familiares or, if flight is anticipated, even in the secret prison, although this is a rigor not now practised. He adds that, when astrologers spontaneously denounce themselves, they are not thrown into the secret prison but into the cárcel de familiares or are given their own houses or the city as a prison.[1489] Friars often, unless the charges were particularly grave, were assigned for detention to the convent of their Order, in accordance with the general policy of guarding the honor of the Church. When the prisons of the tribunals were crowded, convents were also sometimes used as subsidiary prisons, as they were provided with cells for detention.

[Sidenote: _LESS HARSH THAN OTHER GAOLS_]

In some tribunals we also hear of _cárceles medias_, _cárceles comunes_ and _cárceles públicas_, for offences not of faith. These appear to be similar to the _cárcel de familiares_ and, in all of them, confinement was held not to inflict the indelible stain of the secret prison. As a rule, the prisoner in these was not debarred from communication with his friends, although he might be confined _sin comunicacion_. In fact, the whole matter lay at the discretion of the tribunal. We have seen how, in the passionate conflicts of jurisdiction, inquisitors sometimes wreaked vengeance on their opponents by inflicting on them the infamy of confinement in the secret prison. So, on the other hand, culprits charged with heresy, when the proofs seemed slender, were sometimes placed in the _cárceles medias_ and then, as the trial advanced and the evidence grew more compromising, were transferred to the secret prison. Thus, in 1678, Angela Pérez, on trial for Judaism by the tribunal of Toledo, was moved, June 22nd from the _medias_ to the _secretas_; the same occurred at Valladolid, in 1697, in several cases of Judaism, and, as late as 1818 there is an example at Seville, where Ana María Barbero, tried for superstitions and blasphemies, was similarly shifted when the case reached the stage of formal accusation.[1490]

* * * * *

In compassionating the hardships of the secret prison, the horrors of the gaols of the period must not be lost to sight and, in the comparison, we shall see that those of the Inquisition were less vile than those of other jurisdictions. It is true that the ancient laws of Castile proclaimed that prisons were meant not for punishment but for detention while awaiting trial, and that Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1489, ordered a weekly inspection by the judges, who should listen to all complaints made by prisoners, a provision repeated by Charles V, in 1525.[1491] Yet the petition of the Córtes of Madrid, in 1534, shows how little attention these enlightened enactments received and the condition of the gaols can be conjectured from that of Valencia, where, about 1630, Pedro Bonet, secretary of the Inquisition, was confined, while a competencia was fought over him, and when he was surrendered to the tribunal he was in such a state that he died within three days.[1492] It is certain that the Inquisition regarded its secret prison as more humane than the royal gaol, even in modern times, for in 1816, when Don Agustin Pirala was tried by both jurisdictions, for certain irreligious and "anti-political" propositions, the tribunal of Madrid, in procuring his transfer to its cells, asserted that this was to relieve him from the inevitable hardships of the royal gaol in which he was confined.[1493]

This may well be true, for the secret prison had the reputation of being less harsh than those of the spiritual jurisdictions. In 1629, Fray Diego de Medina, when brought before the tribunal of Valladolid for uttering some radical heresies, explained that, in his convent de la Victoria, he was kept in the stocks in the convent prison, and he had made the heretical assertions in order to be transferred to the milder treatment of the Inquisition, whereupon he was dismissed with a reprimand. We might regard this as an isolated case were it not for a similar one, about 1675, where a cleric, confined in the episcopal prison, pretended Judaism with the object of being removed to the Inquisition. In this instance the tribunal rebuked him and remanded him to the tender mercies of his bishop.[1494]

Whether the secret prisons were better or worse than the royal and ecclesiastical gaols, they were dismal and unwholesome places of confinement. Of course as structures they varied greatly. Few, if any, of the buildings of the Inquisition were constructed for its use. In Saragossa the royal castle of the Aljafería, in Barcelona the royal palace, in Valencia the archiepiscopal palace, in Seville the castle of Triana, in Córdova the Alcázar were occupied and utilized, and elsewhere such buildings as seemed suitable were taken. Those which had served as castles had dungeons already provided; in the others, cells were constructed. Under the circumstances there could be no common plan and no general standard of convenience or healthfulness. It is to be hoped that not many were like that of Palermo, where there were great subterranean caverns in which the inquisitors constructed cells for their prisoners, but probably not much better was part of the secret prison of Toledo, of which we get a glimpse in 1592. Mari Rodríguez, after lying there for nine months, with a year-old baby, asked an audience and begged to be removed from her cell, for it was entirely dark and she and her companions suffered greatly and they were sick, to which the inquisitor coldly replied that what she needed was to discharge her conscience and save her soul and, for the rest, she should have justice.[1495]

That the prisons should be unsanitary was a matter of course at the period and the death-rate must have been large, especially during the pestilences, which are of constant recurrence in the annals of the time. Statistics are of course unattainable, but the records frequently refer to the death of prisoners during trial. In Valladolid, the report of 1630 to the Suprema includes the names of twelve deceased prisoners, with the existing state of their cases and, in the great Madrid auto de fe of 1680, all the dead who were burnt in effigy, to the number of eight, had died in the prisons.[1496]

[Sidenote: _TERROR INSPIRED_]

Confinement in the secret prison was regarded as one of the gravest misfortunes that could befall a man, in consequence of the indelible stain that it inflicted on him and his descendants. The Consults Magna of 1696 dwells eloquently on the horror inspired by such imprisonment and the injustice of subjecting to it, at the whim of an inquisitor, those whose offences had no relation to the faith. In support of this it adduces the case of a woman of Seville, in 1682, who had some words with the wife of a secretary of the tribunal; the alguazil was sent to arrest her and, in her frenzied desire to avoid imprisonment, she threw herself from an upper window and broke both her legs. The Consulta adds that those who were guilty only of an insult to a familiar were not infrequently thrust into the deepest dungeons of the secret prisons.[1497] The terror thus caused was rated as one of the most efficient powers possessed by the Inquisition. When, in 1622, Gregory XV granted to the bishops concurrent jurisdiction over the crime of solicitation, the remonstrances addressed to him from Spain represented this dread as a deterrent much more powerful than anything that the bishops could bring to bear. In the royal instructions to the Duke of Alburquerque, then ambassador at Rome, it is argued that the fear of the infamy wrought by the prisons of the Inquisition restrains the hardiest culprits.[1498] Power such as this was liable to constant abuse, even after the Suprema had deprived the tribunals of initiative and, when the attention of Carlos IV was called to it, in 1798, by the case of Ramon de Salas, a professor at Salamanca, he proposed to require special royal permission before consignment to the secret prison, but Llorente tells us that court intrigues prevented the enactment of this wholesome reform.[1499]

* * * * *

The cruelty which kept all prisoners in chains was not peculiar to the Inquisition, for we have seen that it was a common practice in the secular gaols. An Italian visiting Madrid, in 1592, describes three prisons there; that of the court, of the city and of the priests, and says that all prisoners, no matter how slight their offences, were fettered. It was evidently a novelty to him which he sought to explain by the insecurity of the buildings.[1500] None of the Instructions refer to chains, but a chance allusion of Pablo García shows that their use was assumed as a matter of course, and this occasionally presents itself in the trials as when, in 1565, Pierre de Bonneville asks their removal to enable him to change his drawers and, in 1647, Alonso Velázquez, who had escaped and was recaptured, describes how he rid himself of them.[1501]

While thus the Inquisition is not to be taxed with special cruelty in following the universal custom, it had its own methods of inflicting intolerable hardship in special cases. When a heretic proved to be impenitent, a _mordaza_, or gag, was applied to him. What was the exact form of this instrument of torture it would be impossible to say, but the allusions to it show that it was regarded as a severe infliction. When thus worn in prison it was not a mere precaution against the prisoner spreading his heresies, for an order of the Suprema prescribes that no one be allowed to speak with him except the confessor sent to him in the night before his execution, while even then the mordaza was not to be removed.[1502] There was another device of pure cruelty--the _pié de amigo_--an iron fork or crotch, fitted to the chin and secured by a band around the neck or the waist, to keep the head up and rigidly fixed. The customary use of this was on culprits scourged through the streets or paraded in _vergüenza_, but it was sometimes employed to heighten the sufferings of prisoners, either through mere malignity or to induce confession. When the celebrated Doctor Agustin Cazalla was burnt in Valladolid, in 1559, envoys from the tribunal sent to him the afternoon before the auto de fe found him in a dark cell, loaded with chains and wearing a pié de amigo, although he had freely confessed, recanted and begged for mercy.[1503] In 1599, in the case of Jacques Pinzon, a French Calvinist, in Toledo, who made a disturbance in the prison, fifty lashes were administered and a pié de amigo was ordered, April 20th. At an audience granted him six months later, October 19th, he is described as still wearing it, as well as two pairs of fetters and, in this case, the pié de amigo extended from the neck to the right hand.[1504]

[Sidenote: _ESCAPE_]

In spite of fetters, escape from the secret prison was by no means rare, but it was not often finally successful, for the organization of the Inquisition generally enabled it to recapture the fugitive. A description of the culprit was at once distributed, with a mandate ordering the civil authorities to summon every one to assist and the familiars and commissioners to scour the roads, under pain of excommunication and five hundred ducats.[1505] Thus an army was promptly on foot, every suspicious stranger was scrutinized, and the fugitive was usually soon arrested and returned. In the jurisprudence of the period, breaking gaol was held to be a confession of guilt and some authorities held that this applied to the prisoners of the Inquisition, but Simancas and Rojas agree in regarding this as excessive severity. If the fugitive was recaptured, the ordinary practice was to give him one or two hundred lashes; his trial was resumed and carried forward to the end. If he was not recaptured he was prosecuted for contumacy _in absentia_.[1506] Numerous cases attest the accuracy of this although, when the culprit was a person of condition, the scourging was replaced by stricter imprisonment and increased severity in the sentence.[1507] For those who eluded recapture, the prosecution for contumacy had but one ending--the absentee was held to be a self-confessed and impenitent heretic, fit only for the stake. Thus, in 1586, Jean de Salines, a Frenchman, on trial for Lutheranism in Valencia, succeeded in escaping with a number of fellow-prisoners. He was not recaptured; the necessary edicts of summons were issued in due order and, as a contumacious heretic, he was burnt in effigy, January 23, 1590 although, at the time of his evasion his case had already been voted on, with the insignificant sentence of abjuration _de levi_ and six months' seclusion.[1508]

* * * * *

The cruellest feature of inquisitorial prison discipline was the rigid denial of all intercourse with the outer world. In the secular gaols, the state always had the right of imprisoning _sin comunicacion_, where there were special reasons for such rigor, but in the secret prisons of the Holy Office this was the universal rule, enforced with the utmost solicitude as an essential part of its highly prized secrecy. We have seen that, from the moment of arrest until delivery to the gaoler, the prisoner was not allowed to exchange a word with any one but the officials, and this was continued with the same strictness when he was within the walls, so far as concerned the outer world, to which he was as one already in the tomb. He could learn nothing of those whom he held dear, nor could they conjecture his fate until, after perhaps the lapse of years, he appeared in an auto de fe as one destined to the stake or to the galleys or to perpetual prison. It would be impossible to compute the sum of human misery thus wantonly inflicted by the Inquisition during its centuries of existence--misery for which the only excuse was that communication with friends might aid in his defence. According to inquisitorial theory, the presumption of guilt was so absolute that all measures were justified which would hinder fraudulent defence.

[Sidenote: _SEGREGATION_]

This strictness was not observed at first. The Instructions of 1488 call attention to the evils arising from communication with prisoners and order inquisitors to see in future that it is not permitted, except by the admittance of religious persons for their spiritual benefit.[1509] This received scant attention, for the Instructions of 1498 order alguazils and gaolers not to permit the entrance of wives or kindred, and whatever is sent to prisoners must be examined to ensure that no letters or messages reach them. Even inquisitors and other officials were forbidden to speak with prisoners except in the presence of another official.[1510] This rigor was relaxed, for an order of the Suprema, in 1514, provided that no one from the outside should speak with a prisoner, except by special licence of the inquisitor, and then only in his presence or that of a notary, and a further concession, in 1536, was that, if a prisoner desired an interview with his wife, the inquisitor, if he saw fit, could grant permission.[1511] These slender concessions, however, were soon withdrawn and, in 1546, officials were reminded that only those permitted by the Instructions could be admitted and any contraventions would be severely punished.[1512] Surreptitious communications were difficult to prevent, and so little were the officials trusted that two locks were required on each cell-door, so that the alcaide or gaoler could not enter without his assistant.[1513] The success with which all this was enforced is boastingly alluded to in a report of the Valladolid auto de fe of May 21, 1559, where it is declared that the inquisitorial process was so secret that no one knew what was the offence of any prisoner till he appeared on the scaffold.[1514]

The increasing importance attached to this is revealed in the Instructions of 1561, which take for granted that all access from outside is forbidden and which regulate the interior life of the prison with the same object. Everything brought to a prisoner, whether provisions or other matters, was reported to the inquisitors who decided as to its delivery; if allowed, it was minutely examined to see that it transmitted no message. If it were found that prisoners had communicated with each other, no pains were spared to find how it was done and what had passed between them. When prisoners were confined together, if their cell was changed, they were kept together and not scattered among others. The segregation from the world was maintained to the end; at the auto de fe no one was allowed to speak with penitents, except the confessors assigned to them, and those who were burnt were sent to their last reckoning without being allowed to learn what was the fate of those whom they held dear. When penitents left the prison, after the auto, they were subjected to the _avisos de cárceles_, in which they were examined under oath as to all that they had seen or heard while confined, and were ordered, under heavy penalties, to reveal nothing of their own experiences.[1515] All this was not wanton and cold-blooded cruelty; it was merely the pitiless enforcement of a rule which was superior to all the promptings of humanity.

In the fulfilment of the rule the most minute regulations were multiplied and reiterated. The alcaide was warned to be especially careful about his wife and children, who were never to be allowed to see the prisoners; no one was to be admitted to the cells, except the sworn attendant who served the food, and when, as in some tribunals, it was served uncooked for the prisoners to cook, it was not to be wrapped in paper but was to be brought in earthen pots. In serving food and in cleaning cells, the door of one was always to be securely locked before opening another; no windows which looked upon those of the cells were allowed to be opened; in Murcia, the water-carrier who served the Inquisition was not allowed to enter the court-yard to fill the jars, but to do so from a window opening upon the court, or to have the water in a room where the jars could be filled.[1516] No precaution was too minute, no watchfulness too careful, when the supreme object was concerned of isolating the prisoners from their friends and from each other.

[Sidenote: _WRITING MATERIALS_]

Yet there were ways of eluding the vigilance of the tribunals, of which bribery of the underlings was the most frequent. Even the alcaides were not insensible to such seductions and a writer advises them to take warning by the example of those who enter office in honor and leave it in ignominy.[1517] The kindred and friends of prisoners were frequently people of means and there could be no hesitation in outlays to circumvent the cruel rules which forbade to them and to the captives all knowledge of each other's fate. The Inquisition was by no means consistent in its treatment of those who thus violated its regulations. In 1635, Miguel de Maradillo, a bricklayer working on the roof of the prison of Valladolid, carried a message from one prisoner to another informing him that his wife and son had been arrested. On another occasion he told the same prisoner that his daughter had been relieved of the sanbenito and he conveyed a paper from him to them. In this he seems to have been actuated merely by compassion and his punishment was light--a reprimand, six months' exile from Valladolid and prohibition of future employment on the building of the Inquisition. In 1655, Francisco López Capadocia, on trial by the tribunal of Valladolid, was subjected to a second prosecution, for communicating with other prisoners and was sentenced only to reprimand and exile.[1518] Greater severity seems to have been shown when employees of the tribunals were the guilty parties. In 1591, when Don Alonzo de Mendoza was confined in Toledo on a charge of heresy, his friends outside established correspondence by means of the cook, Francisca de Saavedra, who conveyed the letters in the dishes. She admitted having received bribes to the amount of 8160 maravedís and was punished with a fine of 6000, besides a hundred lashes and four years' exile.[1519] Still harsher was the treatment, about 1650, in Mexico, of Esteban Domingo, a negro slave employed as an assistant in the crowded inquisitorial prison. He was detected in carrying for money communications between the prisoners and their friends, for which he was condemned to two hundred lashes and six years in the galleys.[1520]

Towards the close of its career the Inquisition seems to manifest a disposition to relax somewhat in its rigidity. In 1815 the Madrid tribunal referred to the Suprema a petition from Doña Manuela Osorno to be permitted to see her husband, Don Vicente Lema, then in its prison. The answer was that, after he had completed his declarations, she might be allowed to see him once or twice a week, in the presence of an inquisitor, but only to confer on their domestic affairs. To this tendency may also be attributed the leniency shown to Alfonso González, barber of the tribunal of Murcia, who made use of his position to convey letters and paper to Francisco Villaescusa, a prisoner, and who was benignantly treated with a reprimand and disability to hold office under the Inquisition.[1521]

A necessary feature of the prohibition of communication was that prisoners were debarred from the use of writing materials, except under the strictest supervision. Some use of them was unavoidable, when drawing up a defence or a petition to the tribunal, opportunity for which was never refused, but they were required to apply to the inquisitors for paper, stating the number of sheets wanted, when these were carefully numbered and rubricated by the secretary, at the upper right-hand corner, and were required to be scrupulously returned, so that there could be no withholding of any for another purpose. This device was prescribed by the Suprema in 1534 and remained the invariable rule.[1522] Thus when Fray Vicente Selles, in Valencia, at an audience of June 27, 1692, asked for two sheets of paper and, on June 30th, returned one and a half in blank, saying that what he had written on the other half-sheet was false and he had thrown it into the filth, he was made to fetch it, filthy as it was.[1523] Whatever quantity a prisoner asked was given to him, and some consumed paper by the quire--indeed, Fray Luis de Leon relieved the tedium and anxiety of his four years' imprisonment at Valladolid by writing his classical devotional work, the "Nombres de Cristo."

* * * * *

While, as we have seen, great care was taken to prevent prisoners from communicating with each other, it by no means follows that confinement was solitary. As a general rule it was regarded as preferable that male prisoners should be alone, and that women should have companionship, but there could be no hard and fast line of policy followed, except that accomplices and _negativos_ (those who denied the accusation) should not be placed together. Husband and wife were thus always separated but, when occasion required, there was no hesitation in crowding four or five persons together and, in the careless confidence of common misfortune, this often opened a valuable source of information, for there never seems to have been any scruple in betraying that confidence in the hope of winning favor by reporting to the tribunal the compromising utterances of cell-companions. The object in keeping apart those who were accomplices was to prevent their encouraging each other in denial and agreeing on a common line of defence. Men who were confined by themselves sometimes asked for a companion and women more frequently did so.[1524]

[Sidenote: _REGULATIONS_]

It was impossible that discipline should be uniform at all times and places and we sometimes find it exceedingly lax. It infers great looseness when, in 1546, the Suprema felt it necessary to enjoin care in permitting prisoners freely to visit each other and, in the trial of Isabel Reyner at Toledo, in 1570, we find her stating, in an audience, that in passing through the prison she saw a fellow-prisoner who informed her that her husband and Estevan Carrier were also prisoners, and who asked her why she was imprisoned.[1525] In fact, as we gather from chance allusions in the trials, there must have been a certain freedom of movement. In the case of Benito Ferrer, in 1621, at Toledo, there was an investigation as to his sanity, in which the alcaide spoke of his going regularly to the cistern for water and cooking his food like the rest, while the assistant described taking him to the latrines when desired. From the trial of Jacques Pinzon, in Granada, in 1599, we learn that, in the morning, the alcaide brought the prisoners water and returned after mass with their food; the mention of a pan to hold ashes shows that they had fire, and we hear of pots, spoons and other utensils.[1526] There was evidently a diversity of routine in the different tribunals and when Valdés, in 1562, was obliged to order that prisoners were not to go for their rations, because they met the servants of the purveyor, and that the alcaide must receive the food and carry it to the cells, it argues that, in some tribunals at least, a considerable freedom of movement had existed.[1527]

In 1662, a minute code of instructions for the alcaide shows us what at that time were the regulations. On rising in the morning, he is to visit all the cells and see how the prisoners are; he is to examine carefully for openings through which they may communicate with each other; doors are to be carefully closed and he is not to leave with the prisoners knives, cords or scissors--if scissors are needed, he is to stay while they are used and take them away. He is not to give them books to read without permission of the inquisitors. Rations are served twice a week--on Sundays and Thursdays--and, on the afternoon previous, he is to see each prisoner, ascertain what he wants, and set it down in a book so that the purveyor may provide it. Every nightfall he is to examine the cells to guard against attempts to escape, searching under the pillows for articles that would assist flight, or for writing materials. Prisoners able to cook their food will do so in a _brasero_; for those who cannot, the cooking is done by an appointee of the tribunal.[1528] All this shows a commendable desire to avoid unnecessary harshness, yet the regulations enforce one hardship which appears to have been universal at all periods after the earliest--the prohibition of lights, a severe infliction for, in the obscurity of their cells, the hours of darkness must have seemed interminable. It is probable that at first this was not the rule for, in 1497, in Valencia, there is an item of 7s. 4d. for lights, in the account of the expenses of Alonso de Roman, who had lain in the secret prison for nine months and nine days.[1529]

Of course, in the general venality of the period, prison officials were not always inaccessible to bribery, and money could procure relaxation of the rules but, when detected, it was visited with a severity not often shown to delinquent officials. This is illustrated by a case in Toledo, in 1591, when judicious liberality procured unlawful privileges, such as having cell doors open, allowing communications and other similar indulgences. Francisco Méndez de Lema, the alcaide, attempted flight, but was caught and sentenced to a hundred lashes, galley-service, exile and deprivation of office. His cousin and assistant, Miguel de Xea, confessed partially and was tortured without extracting more; he escaped with dismissal, disability for office and four years of exile.[1530]

There was one regulation which bore with especial severity on the innocent, while it was a matter of indifference to the heretic. This was the deprivation of all religious consolation during the period, often prolonged for years, of incarceration. It is difficult to understand this in the professors of a theology which teaches the infinite importance of the sacraments as aids to spiritual development as well as to salvation, especially when so large a portion of the prisoners were good Catholics tried on charges which did not infer formal heresy. Possibly it may be explained by the customary assumption of the guilt of the accused, who had thus incurred _ipso facto_ excommunication, and the Spanish Inquisition had the example of the Roman, whose prisoners were similarly not allowed to receive the sacraments or to hear mass.[1531] Yet the great canonist Azpilcueta, whose attention was probably drawn to the matter by the case of his client Carranza, thus deprived of the sacraments for eighteen years, tells us that there is no law justifying the Spanish Inquisition in this, though perhaps it may have special authority and also good reasons. To him, however, it appeared that the sacraments would soften the hearts of prisoners and lead them to confess, while it was cruel to leave them exposed without defence to the assaults of the demon during the many years of their captivity.[1532] Yet the refusal was absolute. Fray Luis de Leon, after three years of imprisonment, pleaded earnestly for the sacraments, but the only reply of the Suprema to his petition was to tell the Valladolid tribunal to finish the case as soon as convenient.[1533]

[Sidenote: _SACRAMENTAL CONFESSION_]

While the sacraments were denied, sacramental confession was allowed, though of course the priest could not grant absolution. The earliest allusion I have met to this is an order by Cardinal Manrique in 1529, and, in 1540, formal instructions were issued that, when a prisoner asks for a confessor, if the case admits of it, a proper person should be given to him.[1534] This privilege was somewhat abridged by the elaborate provisions of the Instructions of 1561, which are framed to turn it to advantage. If a prisoner in good health asks for a confessor, it is safer not to grant the request, unless he has confessed judicially and has satisfied the evidence. But, as he cannot be absolved for heresy until reconciled to the Church, such confession is not of full effect unless he is in the article of death or a woman in the peril of child-birth, in which case the canon laws are to be observed. If a sick man asks for a confessor he shall have one, who shall be sworn to secrecy and to reveal to the tribunal any commission entrusted to him, if it is outside of confession, and to refuse it if within confession; the inquisitors shall instruct him to tell the prisoner that he cannot be absolved, if guilty, unless he confesses judicially. If his judicial confession satisfies the evidence, he is to be formally reconciled before he dies and, when judicially absolved, the confessor shall absolve him sacramentally when, if there is nothing to prevent it, he may receive Christian burial, as secretly as possible. If a sick man does not ask for a confessor and the physician is apprehensive of the result, he must urge him in every way to confess.[1535] The advantage thus afforded by the confessional is illustrated in the trial for Judaism of Ana López, at Valladolid, in 1637. She had denied, but was taken sick and declared by the physician to be in danger. To the confessor she admitted that, at the age of seventeen, she was taught Judaism, that she subsequently returned to the true faith until, on coming to Valladolid, a woman perverted her. The confessor warned her that she must confess judicially; she authorized him to report her confession and he absolved her sacramentally. An inquisitor with a notary went to her cell, when she repeated her confession and gave the name of the woman who had perverted her, and, on her recovery, her trial was resumed when she confirmed her confession.[1536]

It is the kindly rule of the Church that absolution is never to be refused to the dying; he is to be saved from hell and can settle the account of his sins in purgatory, or by an indulgence or a mass on a privileged altar. With this the Inquisition did not interfere, as its professed object was the saving of souls and it even, by a carta acordada of 1632, permitted communion to dying heretics who had confessed judicially and satisfied the evidence. It required, however, the wafer to be consecrated in the tribunal, if there was time; if the haste was extreme, it could be brought from the parish church, but without pomp or procession.[1537] Even the veneration due to the Godhead had to yield to the secrecy which forbade it to be known that a prisoner was dying in the Holy Office. In the same spirit, when a prisoner died without reconciliation, the alcaide reported it to the inquisitors, who ordered the secretary to identify the body and bury it secretly.[1538] It was thrust into a hole, without his family knowing his fate until, if his trial was unfinished, his heirs would be summoned to defend his fame and memory or, if it had reached a point where sentence could be pronounced, they saw his effigy reconciled or burnt in an auto de fe. Even when he had confessed and been reconciled on the death-bed, we have just seen that his Christian burial was to be as secret as possible. When the trial ended in acquittal or suspension, if he had property sequestrated, the lifting of the sequestration would announce it to the heirs; otherwise, it does not seem that there was any provision for their notification. Suicide in prison, which was not infrequent, was regarded as conclusive proof of impenitence, even if the prisoner had confessed and professed repentance, but his heirs were allowed to defend him on the score of insanity, failing which he was burnt in effigy.[1539]

[Sidenote: _FEMALE PRISONERS_]

Sickness was of frequent occurrence and was treated with creditable humanity. The Instructions of 1561 require that the sick shall have every care and that whatever the physician deems necessary for them shall be provided.[1540] Of course the fulfilment of this command must have varied with the temper of the tribunals, but nevertheless the spirit dictating it is in marked contrast with the conduct of the gaols of the period. When cases transcended the resources of the Inquisition, the ordinary course was to transfer the patient to a hospital, in disregard of the cherished secrecy of the prison. Instances of this are common enough in the records and a single case will suffice for its illustration. November 6, 1641, Juan de Valdés, on trial for bigamy in Valladolid, asked an audience to beg for despatch as he was very sick. This was confirmed by the alcaide and by the physician, who said that for nineteen days he had had a tercian and was too weak to be bled, and moreover he was suffering from stone and strangury; that he could not be cured in the prison and should be removed to a hospital. This was done, the hospital authorities being notified not to allow him to escape and to keep the tribunal advised of his condition. In January, 1642, he was reported as being still in mortal danger, but he recovered, was returned to the secret prison, and was sentenced on August 21st.[1541]

* * * * *

The care of female prisoners was naturally a subject of some perplexity, especially as the refinement of matrons and women assistants was unknown to the Inquisition. When the Instructions of 1498 order that the prison for men and for women shall be separate,[1542] it does not infer that previously they had been herded promiscuously together, but that in future distinct quarters should be provided for the sexes--a provision which was not observed, as it was deemed sufficient that women should be confined separately so that there could not be communication between them and the men. The condition of helpless women, virtually at the mercy of their male attendants, in the secrecy which shrouded everything within the prison walls, can readily be imagined, and there must have been outrages coming to the knowledge of Ximenes, in 1512, that aroused him to a sense of the dangerous opportunities existing, for in that year an order was issued threatening death to any attendant who should have intercourse with a female prisoner.[1543] The severity of the penalty measured the gravity of the necessity calling for it, but, like so many other salutary provisions, the tribunals were too merciful to enforce it on their subordinates. In 1590, Andrés de Castro, alcaide of the Valencia prison, was tried for seducing a female prisoner, kissing and soliciting others, allowing communications between prisoners and accepting bribes from their kindred. There were twenty-nine accusing witnesses; he denied the charges but virtually admitted their truth by breaking gaol. On his recapture, for this complicated series of offences he escaped with a hundred lashes, three years in the galleys, perpetual exile from Valencia, and disability for office in the Inquisition--a sentence which, when compared with the habitual severity of the tribunals, shows how lightly his sexual crime was regarded by his judges.[1544] It was not that the death-penalty had been abrogated, for we find it repeated, in 1652, in the Logroño instructions to alcaides.[1545] Doubtless the rule mentioned above, that women should be gathered together in their cells, was designed to afford them protection against their gaolers.

In the not unusual case of the arrest of pregnant women, due consideration was given to their condition, and suitable temporary accommodation was found for them, during confinement, outside of the prison. Thus, in the case of María Rodríguez, in the tribunal of Valladolid, who was arrested June 3, 1641, the delay in presenting the accusation, until September 16th, is explained on the record by her being pregnant and removed from the prison until she recovered.[1546] This was an improvement on the earlier practice, if we may believe the Llerena memorial of 1506, which states that women in the throes of child-birth were denied all assistance, even that of a midwife; they were abandoned to nature and many had perished in consequence.[1547]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: _HUMANE REGULATIONS_]

It was not only in the general prescriptions of the Instructions that regard for the welfare of the prisoners is manifested. Special orders issued from time to time as to details are animated by the same spirit. Thus, in 1517, Cardinal Adrian told the Sicilian inquisitors (in a letter probably addressed to all the tribunals) that they must pay particular attention to the qualities requisite in the gaoler; they must sedulously bear in mind that the prison is for detention and not for punishment; the prisoners are to be well treated and not be defrauded in their food, for which ample provision must be made; the prison must be inspected every Saturday, by one of the inquisitors, and not fortnightly as provided in the Instructions; those of the prisoners who have trades are to work and thus contribute to their support and, if the officials give the women sewing to do, they must be paid.[1548] An extract made, in 1645, from a book of instructions which was read annually in the tribunals, shows that this praiseworthy care for the welfare of the prisoners was the permanent policy of the Inquisition. It prescribes the utmost punctuality in inspecting the cells every fortnight and learning what the inmates desire, reporting this to the tribunal, which decided what each one should have and, if there was a surplus in the allowance for rations from which it could be procured, the alcaide was at once to be ordered to see that the purveyor bought it; if he neglected anything he was to be reproved for the wrong committed in his lack of punctuality. Special attention was called to serving the rations in the morning, so that the prisoners could prepare their midday meal. Meat was to be given daily, and only one day's rations at a time in hot weather, lest it should spoil; in cool weather, two days' supply; and this was so important for the health of the prisoners that it should be the special charge of some one, while an inquisitor ought occasionally to look to it.[1549]

All this is admirable in tone and spirit; unfortunately its execution depended on its enforcement by the inquisitors, on their regular performance of inspection, and on holding the gaolers responsible by rigorous punishment for derelictions. The duty of inspection by inquisitors had been prescribed as indispensable by the Instructions of 1488, but it was impossible to make them obey and complaints of their negligence are frequent. In 1632 it was found necessary to reissue the Instructions of 1488; in 1644 we have the testimony of a contemporary that, in some places at least, it was regularly, if perfunctorily, performed and the Logroño instructions of 1652 make it the duty of the alcaide to remind the inquisitors of it every fortnight, because it is customarily forgotten.[1550] The other requisite, severity of punishment for derelictions, was also lacking, through the customary tenderness shown to delinquent officials.

It would be manifestly unjust to condemn as a whole the management of the prisons: it would be equally unwarranted to praise them indiscriminately. Everything depended on the conscientious discharge of duty by the inquisitors and no general judgement can be formed as to the condition of so many prisons, during three centuries, except that their average standard was considerably higher than that in other jurisdictions and that, if there were abodes of horror, such as have been described by imaginative writers, they were wholly exceptional. There were good and there were bad. The memorials of Llerena and Jaen, in 1506 describe them as horrible dens, overrun with rats, snakes and other vermin, where the wretched captives sickened in despair and were starved by the embezzlement of a large portion of the moneys allowed for their support, while no physician was permitted to attend the sick and the attendants maltreated them like dogs.[1551] Making allowance for rhetorical exaggeration we can imagine that this description was applicable to Córdova under Lucero. Matters seem to have been not much better at Seville in 1560, where the oppression of the alcaide, Gaspar de Benavides, provoked a despairing revolt in which his assistant was mortally wounded. Vengeance was wreaked on the participators in the fray, of whom one was burnt alive and another, a boy of fourteen, had four hundred lashes and was sent to the galleys for life, while Gaspar, who had provoked it, was let off with appearing in an auto de fe, forfeiture of wages and perpetual banishment from Seville.[1552]

[Sidenote: _VARIABLE TREATMENT_]

When malfeasance in office escaped with such ill-judged leniency, it was impossible to maintain discipline and the prisoners suffered accordingly. As the result of an inspection of Barcelona by Doctor Alonso Perez, the alcaide Monserrat Pastor is scolded, in 1544, for keeping a mistress in his house, for placing a kinsman in charge of the prison and absenting himself, for receiving presents from discharged prisoners, for frequent absence, leaving the prison unguarded, for combining the incompatible positions of gaoler and _dispensero_, and of making the women prisoners work and taking their earnings, but Pastor was only reprimanded and ordered to restore the presents and the women's earnings. Virtual immunity invited continuance of abuses and, in 1550, after another inspection, we find the Suprema again adverting to the evil results of combining the functions of gaoler and dispensero and ordering the inquisitors to fill the latter position.[1553]

The prison of the Canary tribunal at times seems to have been equally mismanaged. An Englishman named John Hill was brought there from Ferro, June 23, 1574, with nothing but his clothes and no money. For nine months his complaints were loud and frequent; a day's ration was insufficient for a single meal; he begged for more bread and water, also for a mat to lie on, as he had to sleep on the ground and he could not rest for the lice and fleas; for more than two months he prayed for a shirt to cover his nakedness and, though an order was issued, January 22nd to give him one, it had to be repeated February 18th. Even as late as 1792, Don Juan Perdomo complained that for fourteen months the alcaide had kept him on a diet of salt fish, that he would allow him to change his linen but once a fortnight, and that he caused him to suffer such torment from thirst that he would go into the court-yard and cry aloud, hoping that some passer-by would summon the alcaide.[1554]

Yet other passages in the Canary record show a praiseworthy desire to alleviate the rigors of confinement and in general it may be said that the condition of the prisoners depended wholly on the temper and character of the officials in charge. When these were kindly, the prisoners were spared unnecessary hardships. Francisco Ortiz, in 1529, at Toledo, bore willing testimony to good treatment which he had not anticipated.[1555] In 1563, Fernando Díaz, a peasant, after a month's detention in Toledo, speaks of improved health; here, he says, he has mutton to eat, while at home he had only sardines.[1556] In 1567, a member of the Suprema, visiting the prison of Valladolid, was told by Leonor de Cisneros that she had nothing to complain of; she had mutton and bread and wine and fruit and was well treated.[1557] As she was a relapsed, whose husband had been burnt eight years before, she probably had no property and the expense was defrayed by the tribunal.

These are by no means isolated instances. In 1541, at Toledo, Juan García, a day-laborer on trial, after six weeks in prison, asked that night-clothes be given to him as to the other prisoners, as he was obliged to sleep in the garments worn during the day, when the inquisitor at once ordered him to be supplied.[1558] In 1657, the accounts of the tribunal of Madrid show 447-1/2 reales spent on clothing for a poor prisoner and those of the Suprema, in 1690, have an item of 688 reales devoted to the same purpose.[1559] We have seen that warrants for arrest ordered beds to be brought with the prisoner, as the Inquisition did not furnish them, in accordance with an order of 1525, which assumes that this was to relieve the hardships of those brought from a distance.[1560] Yet, even in the financial pressure of the seventeenth century, we find in the accounts of the Madrid tribunal, in 1659, an order, July 11th, to the receiver to pay 230 reales for the hire of beds for poor prisoners up to July 15th.[1561] Even more noteworthy are some entries arising from the trial in Madrid of Francisco de Matos, in 1680-81. He seems to have had five children for whose support was spent, in about a year from September, 1680, 3519 reales, of which 1284 were paid to the Hospicio Real de Pobres for its care of three of them during sickness.[1562] The tribunal evidently felt itself obliged to take care of the helpless children, and such incidents serve to show that, when the inquisitors had humanitarian instincts there was nothing in the policy of the Holy Office to prevent their full manifestation.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: _EXPENSES_]

It is remarkable that, during the period of most active work, there seems to have been no general settled system of defraying the maintenance of prisoners. There is no provision for it in the instructions of 1484, but in Torquemada's supplementary orders of December, the receivers were required to pay the expenses.[1563] Yet we have seen that immediately after this the alguazil was in receipt of a salary equal to, or more than, that of the inquisitors because, as Ferdinand said, he had to meet the great charge of the prisoners--"tiene tan gran costo con los presos"--and, as we find this in the salary lists of Saragossa, Burgos, Medina del Campo and Seville, it would seem to be a general rule, while the Instructions of 1498 appear to show it still in force.[1564] Yet the accounts of the Valencia tribunal, in 1497-8, indicate that the maintenance of those who had property was drawn from the sequestrations while the "pobres miserables presos en las carceles" were supported by outside friends or kindred, who were subsequently reimbursed by the receiver. The per diem was 9 dineros for men and 8 for women, while Ali Divit, a Moor and presumably abstemious, was reckoned at 5.[1565]

A letter of Ferdinand, in 1501, authorizing the receiver of Sardinia to include among his disbursements the cost of maintaining prisoners, would indicate that this was becoming the rule, but another letter of the same date calling for reimbursement to Anton López, a yeoman of his guard, who had been ordered by an inquisitor to support certain prisoners, shows that no definite system was as yet established.[1566] These irregular methods afforded opportunity for embezzlement and extortion, resulting doubtless in much suffering among the captives. The memorials of Llerena and Jaen, in 1506 complain of conspiracy among the officials to cut down the rations, and that only 10 maravedís a day were allowed, from which 2 were deducted for shaving, linen and cooking, when 25 or 30 were required, at current prices, for bread alone.[1567]

At length the alcaide or gaoler appears as the official handling the funds when, in 1510, Ferdinand ordered Villacis, the receiver of Seville, to pay him 5000 maravedís because he had fed the prisoners during a time of pestilence.[1568] This was evidently an exceptional case, arising from an emergency, but it was adopted, in 1516 and 1517, in some instructions of the Suprema to the tribunal of Sicily; where there were sequestrations, the amount was to be drawn from them; in cases of extreme poverty the cost of a moderate diet could be defrayed by the receiver from the confiscations.[1569]

Nearly forty years had passed since the founding of the Inquisition--years of intense activity--and as yet no regular system had been adopted in a matter so important. The necessity was felt and, in 1518, an order was issued in the name of Charles V, which shows that the kindred or friends of the prisoner had been expected to bring his food to the prison. The order recites that, as they come from all parts of the district and are far from their families and property, they suffer greatly. Therefore, in the case of non-residents of the city, the receiver is to pay for food and necessaries, under instructions from the inquisitor. An account is to be kept with each prisoner and, if he is discharged, he shall repay the receiver before his sequestration is lifted; if he is poor, he shall not be asked for it and the auditor shall pass the item in the receiver's accounts.[1570] The liberality of this clause seems to have been a novelty, and it took some time to establish the duty of the Inquisition to prevent its poor prisoners from starving, for we find the queen-regent, in 1531, authorizing their maintenance, at Barcelona, at the expense of the fisc.[1571]

[Sidenote: _RATIONS_]

Yet this was not held as relieving the family from supporting, as far as possible, an imprisoned member. The account of the dispensero or steward, of the Valencia prison, from October 8, 1540 to May 5, 1541, shows that during that period there were twenty-five prisoners thus supported, at least partially, husbands paying for wives, wives for husbands, sons for fathers, etc. The sums received were small and suggest the struggle endured by families to contribute to the necessities of those in gaol; they were paid in trifling amounts of from 5s. 5d. to 8s. 8d., representing probably a monthly assessment, and this was by no means continuous for, in eight cases, only one payment is recorded and in only one case is there more than two payments. For the whole period the aggregate is only 15 libras 19s. 4d., while during this time the steward obtained from the receiver 120 libras 2s., which probably included what the fisc had to pay and what was drawn from the sequestrations of the wealthier prisoners.[1572] With regard to the latter, the rule was to sell the personal property first and then the real estate, and inquisitors were urged, in 1547, to be prompt in collecting from the proceeds, as the sequestrations were apt to be consumed in supporting the family, leaving nothing to repay the fisc for its advances.[1573]

It was the duty of the inquisitor, when a prisoner was brought in, to ascertain, from the receiver and notary of sequestrations, his station in life and his wealth, and to fix the amount of his allowance in accordance with the current prices of provisions, but a wealthy man could spend more if he chose and, if a person of quality wished to have one or two servants incarcerated with him, as in the case of Carranza, this was permitted; what might be left over from their table was to be given to the poor and not to be made a source of profit to the alcaide and dispensero.[1574] There was liberality in this as, in case of confiscation, the estate was diminished by the extra expenditure. Even the ordinary allowance was at the disposition of the prisoner, who could economize on it and spend it in any manner that he chose.[1575]

Thus there never was at any time a fixed and absolute ration, although of course there was a general minimum standard for the poor who had to be supported. Whatever it was, it was liable to alteration as circumstances might dictate. After Jacques Pinzon was imprisoned in Granada, February 25, 1599, on March 9th the alcaide reported that he consumed in one day the ration of two and was dying of hunger, whereupon the inquisitors kindly increased his allowance to a real per day; this kept him quiet for three months, when there was a fresh complaint and 5 maravedís were added.[1576] In 1616, Padre Hieronimo de la Madre de Dios, tried for mysticism, sought his first audience to complain that his ration was insufficient; he wished it increased by a real a day, which could be charged to his sequestrated property.[1577] Evidently prisoners did not hesitate to make their wants known and there was readiness to listen to them.

With the gradual concentration of power in the Suprema it came to regulate this in all the tribunals. In 1635 Valencia reported that, in consequence of the dearness of bread, the prisoners were suffering from hunger, and it asked authority to increase the ration. The Suprema deliberated for five weeks and then ordered an increase to be made "with great compassion." The close supervision exercised is indicated, in 1695, in a criticism on a monthly report from the same tribunal, in which one of the omissions noted is that the ration assigned to each prisoner is not stated.[1578]

The fall in the purchasing power of money, and especially of the debased vellon coinage, necessitated an increase in the ration. In 1641, at Toledo, the ordinary daily allowance was 1-1/2 reales which, by 1677, had doubled to 3 reales.[1579] In Valencia, the ordinary ration had increased to 22 dineros in 1688 and, in 1756, to 2 sueldos.[1580]

[Sidenote: _COLLECTION OF COSTS_]

When the prisons were full and the trials, after the first hurried rush, grew more and more protracted, the expense of maintenance was not small, as can be gathered from occasional indications. Thus, in 1566, we find the Suprema ordering its alguazil mayor to remit to the tribunal of Calahorra 400 ducats to defray the food of prisoners.[1581] In 1586, Benito Sanguino, the receiver of Valencia, in settling his accounts, claimed credit for 19,856s. 11d. paid to the dispensero for the maintenance of poor prisoners, in addition to what he had disbursed for the purpose on the orders of inquisitors, an irregularity for which the Suprema demanded an explanation.[1582] Some light is thrown on the way in which these costs accumulated by the case of Fray Lucas de Allende, guardian of the Franciscan convent of Madrid and one of the dupes of Lucrecia de Leon, a _beata revelandera_. When arrested in 1590, his brother, Alonso de Allende, asked permission to give him an allowance of a real a day--a request which proved costly, as the trial lasted for six years and two months.[1583] In 1659, the orders given by the tribunal of Madrid, for the food and incidentals of its poor prisoners, who seem to have averaged about ten in number, reached an aggregate of 12,874 reales and, in 1681, the amount was 25,748.[1584] As the activity of the Inquisition diminished, and perhaps also as its resources fell short, this drain on its finances was greatly reduced. In a statement of the expenses of the Valencia tribunal, from 1784 to 1790 inclusive, the charge for maintenance of poor prisoners becomes trifling. The total expenditure during these seven years was 501 libras 18s., of which 300 libras 8s. were recovered from the parties, leaving a net outlay of 201 libras 10s., or less than 30 libras per annum.[1585]

The tribunals were unrelenting in the collection of these expenses from all who could be held responsible. In the case of frailes, who could own no property, their communities were liable. Thus, in 1649, the tribunal of Valencia issues an order to collect, from the Provincial of the Augustinians, 600 reales for certain members of his Order who were in its prison. When the trial of Fray Estevan Ramoneda was concluded, September 12, 1696, the Barcelona tribunal rendered to his Order of Merced a bill of 730 reales for his expenses. The Provincial assessed it on all the Mercenarian converts of Catalonia and, on November 15th, the inquisitors scolded the prior of the Barcelona convent for delay, when he replied that his convent had paid its share but that others were dilatory. In 1709, the Suprema issued an order that there must be no exceptions, even to the Barefooted Franciscans, showing that they had been endeavoring to procure exemption.[1586]

The Inquisition was not likely to be more lenient with the laity. Its determination to secure reimbursement is seen in an order of the Valencia tribunal, in 1636, that when Francisco Morales completes the term of galley service to which he has been condemned, he is to be sold to his neighbors to repay what he has cost to the fisc.[1587] These costs were not simply for maintenance in prison, but for expenses attending arrest and trial, including the fees of advocate and procurator and all postage incurred. The whole of this was a first lien on the property of the prisoner and, if he was a _filiusfamilias_, his father was liable and could be forced to pay.[1588] Before an auto de fe, the dispensero and notary of sequestrations carefully made up the account of every penitent who escaped confiscation, and it was the duty of the fiscal to see that, if he had property, he settled or gave an obligation to settle and, if he was poor, that he took an oath to pay whenever he should be able.[1589] How these accounts were swelled is visible in that rendered by the Barcelona tribunal, in 1756, to Don Antonio Adorno, a soldier of gentle blood in the regiment of Asturias. He was only fifty-eight days in prison which, at 2 sueldos a day, amounted to a little less than 6 libras, but the aggregate of the bill was 26. He subscribed his name to this as accurate, stating that he had no property with which to meet it, but that, if God should grant him better fortune, he obligated himself to pay it to the receiver or his duly authorized representative. As his sentence was banishment from the Spanish dominions, this was a pure formality, but it could not be omitted.[1590] A few months later we have a piteous letter from Dr. Agustin Tamarit, a physician of the town of Salas, whose enemies had involved him with the Inquisition, resulting in a charge against him of 5 libras 16s. In reply to a demand for payment he protests that he is miserably poor. During his enforced absence, his colleague, Dr. Rubert, had collected from the town the _conducta_, or stated salary due to both, and refuses to pay over his share; if the tribunal will compel Rubert to settle he will endeavor to sell some wheat and satisfy the account.[1591]

* * * * *

On the whole we may conclude that the secret prisons of the Inquisition were less intolerable places of abode than the episcopal and public gaols. The general policy respecting them was more humane and enlightened than that of other jurisdictions, whether in Spain or elsewhere, although negligent supervision allowed of abuses and there were ample resources of rigor in reserve, when the obstinacy of the impenitent was to be broken down. The one unpardonable feature was the seclusion which kept the unhappy captive ignorant of all that occurred outside of his prison walls and deprived him of facilities for defence and of communication with family and friends. This rendered doubly bitter the prolonged detention which often held him for years in suspense as to their fate and deprived them of all knowledge as to him.