which creditors frequently resorted to in dealing with
troublesome, and no doubt oftentimes unfortunate, debtors.

_CHRISTMAS DAY._

On this most glorious "Day of Days" there are in gaol for debt,
in this town, the following persons, viz.:

1 Head of a Family for 9 94
1 -- do. -- -- 8 12-1/2
1 -- do. -- -- 14 00
1 -- do. -- -- 9 61
1 -- do. -- -- 11 68
1 -- do. -- -- 27 00
1 -- do. -- -- 7 75
1 -- do. for schooling } 11 25
his children, }
1 -- do. discharged 1 88!!!
-----

Who among the opulent is willing to restore a _Father_ to his
Family and Christmas Fire Side?

-------------------------

Sometimes debtors were not actually imprisoned, but were confined to
what was called the "limits of the jail;" that is, certain streets
within a specified distance of the jail. The writer distinctly
remembers, when a boy, of having a man pointed out to him, of whom it
was said he had refused to pay his debts, and so was only allowed to
go at large "within the limits of the jail."

The law under which persons were imprisoned for debt was abolished in
Massachusetts many years ago.

-------------------------

Somewhere about the year 1822 the tread-mill was introduced into
England. It was recommended by the "Society for the Improvement of
Prison Discipline." It was the invention of Mr. Cubitt, of Ipswich, in
England, and probably at that time or soon after it was used in this
country. Some years since there was one, as we are informed, at the
Massachusetts State prison at Charlestown.

_The Tread-Mill_.--We publish to-day an interesting description
of the Tread-Mill, (a new invented Machine to enforce industry in
Prisons,) accompanied by a Plate representing the same, for the
use of which we are indebted to the politeness of the editor of
the Gazette. The introduction of these Mills into the English
prisons is said to have produced much good, and the experiment is
about to be tried in this country. The corporation of the city of
New-York are building one in the yard of their Penitentiary. One
of the late London papers announces the singular fact that on the
12th of September, at the Town-hall, Southwark, the