Page:Japan by the Japanese (1904).djvu/555

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POLICE AND PRISONS
515

the number of medals earned. Such lenient treatment is accorded in the following ways:

1. All medallists are supplied with superior kinds of garments and other articles.

2. Each medallist is allowed to send out two letters per month.

3. Medallists enjoy the privilege of bathing prior to other prisoners, hot water being used in accordance with the general custom of the Japanese people.

4. The supply of accessories is increased in quantity every week for medallists, according to the number of medals granted, to the extent of an increased expense of two sen or less for one meal per person. This increase is granted once a week to the possessor of one medal, twice a week to the possessor of two medals, and three times a week for each possessor of three medals.

5. The allotment of earnings is made in the following proportion, the remainder being applied to prison expenses:

Three-tenths to each felon to whom one medal has been granted.

Four-tenths to each misdemeanant to whom one medal has been awarded.

Four-tenths to each felon having been granted two medals.

Five-tenths to each felon possessing three medals.

Six-tenths to each misdemeanant granted three medals.

Disciplinary punishments to be inflicted upon criminal inmates of prisons are divided into three kinds: (1) Solitary confinement in a windowed cell; (2) the reduction of food supply; and (3) solitary confinement in a dark room. The first is a solitary confinement for two days and nights or less in a cell removed from ordinary cells or prison functionaries’ offices, where the confined prisoner is required to work during working hours. The second is the reduction for a week or less of the supply of food to one-half or a third of the ordinary quantity. The third and last is disciplinary punishment, confining the prisoner alone for five days and nights or less in a dark room, where he is only supplied with half or a third of his usual quantity of food, and is not allowed to have a bed or its furniture. When juvenile offenders of less than sixteen years, or non-condemned children kept in the special establishments of disciplinary correction, have infracted the provisions of disciplinary prison regulations, they are punished by solitary confinement or the reduction of their food-supply, according to the degree of their infraction. This solitary confinement involves their living alone in a room for seventeen days and nights or less, and the reduction in their food-supply consists in lessening it for at least three days to one-half or one-third of its usual quantity.

As a result of recent reforms in prison administration, the attention of the Government has been specially drawn to the