oleon--Complaints of patronage--The penal system--Capital
punishment abolished--History and effect of the
abolition--Statistics--The prison system--Abuses--Enumeration of
prisons--Employment of convicts--Ornamental art amongst
them--Objects made by them--Absence of educational
measures--Criminal statistics (and note)--Visit to the
'intermediate' prison of Vakareschti--An old monastery--Description
of the prison--Scene in the court-yard--Untried prisoners in
fetters--Promiscuous intercourse of prisoners--Mischievous
effects--Views of a 'juge d'instruction' concerning the
system--Various classes of prisoners--Lenient treatment of
them--Partial employment--Safeguards against mutiny--Visit to the
penal salt mine of Doftana (or Telega)--Former treatment of
prisoners--A lingering death--Present treatment--Conditions of
penal servitude--Compared with work of our
colliers--Abuses--Descent into the mine--Its condition--Unearthly
sounds and sights--Enormous salt cave--Floor of the cave--Convicts
at work in chains--Mode of excavating and raising salt--Lighting
the mine for visitors--Return to the surface--Visit to the
penitentiary--Its discreditable condition--Alleged frauds upon
convicts--General mild treatment of criminals in
Roumania--Utilisation of convict labour--Comparison of cost and
results of systems in Roumania and England--Favourable to Roumania.

I.

As in the case of education, so, too, in regard to its judicial and
penal system, the Constitution of Roumania contains many admirable
provisions (articles 13, 18, 104, 105, &c.) for the maintenance of right
and the suppression of wrong-doing. Equal rights, ordinary tribunals,
speedy trial by jury, abolition of death punishment, these are the
excellent principles upon which the judicial system is based; but
neither there, nor for that matter in any country, are they completely
put into practice. There is one Court of Cassation with sections, and a
Court of Accounts at Bucarest, Courts of Appeal at Bucarest, Jassy,
Craiova, and Focsany, and minor tribunals in the chief town of each
district. The French Code of Jurisprudence is adopted, with
modifications which would not interest our readers; but the penal
system is somewhat unique, and is well worthy of a closer study and
consideration. Of the miserable accommodation for the exercise of
judicial authority in Bu