[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—Whilst I do not
wish to deny Mr. Charles Prior's criticism.; about certain prison visitors, may I beg him and those who read his letter not to believe that all prison visitors are either sexual perverts or people who take a delight in observing the unhappiness of others ? As one who has been a visitor, I think I may say that a good many of us, if we reflected on the difference between us and those whom we visited, came to the conclusion that the main distinction was that our friends inside had been found out and that we had not. We met, we argued, and some- times we helped, as man to man, and it was not always we who gave the help.
I have often been consoled by the candid, typically northern, statement of one of my friends, when he said to me in his cell, " You know, you visitors, you don't do no 'arm."—Yours.
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