Sir James Ingham has reported on the case of the
Fenian con- vict McCarthy, who died suddenly from heart complaint im- mediately after his release from prison, and whose death has been attributed to the severity of his treatment while in prison. Sir James Ingham does not think that he was treated with any undue severity in prison, and states the impression of the physician of the prison, Dr. Pitman, that his death was due rather to his liberation than to his imprisonment,—and that the excitement attending the public demonstrations was really the immediate cause of his death. And no doubt this is true, though we must not take Dr. Pittnan's opinion too literally, and suppose that a sentence of penal servitude is, as a rule, at all likely to be a specific against the fatal re- Emits of heart complaint. Whatever may be the advantages of prison life in keeping down excitement, it certainly has also the effect -oft depressing vitality, which cannot be remarkably beneficial -even for patriots with heart complaints. And perhaps in a somewhat indolent age like our own, it may be just as well mot' to spread too widely the illusion that for any complaint -whatever to which men are commonly liable, the best remedy -would be a sentence of penal servitude such as would follow the -commission of treason-felony. Neither the patriotism nor the con- science of our generation is very active, while there are, perhaps, not a few whose love of liberty is hardly equal to their dislike of effort. A political prisoner with a confirmed heart complaint has no very severe discipline to complain of, while he has good medical advice, food, and clothing supplied to him, without -charge.
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