which goes to the emolument of the keeper of the prison. In the Rasp-house, the employment of the prisoners is to saw or rasp log-wood and other woods for the dyers; and the quantity of labour daily required of them amounts to fifty pounds of raspings; which, if the men are strong and diligent, they complete early in the afternoon. The Rasp-house is a quadrangular building, three stories high, with a court-yard in the middle; which I found extremely dirty, and much incommoded with piles of wood. It contains only men prisoners, and the number of persons in confinement did not exceed seventy. The most atrocious criminals are confined on the ground-floor, two in a cell, with an open window guarded with iron bars, where they sleep and work; and notwithstanding the labour they had to perform, they were in general heavily fettered. All the men worked without their shirts, and I observed that some of their backs were marked with stripes, which had been inflicted with no sparing hand. When I say that their labours are concluded early in the afternoon, I do
