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Rh declared their preference for hanging, because the criminal would then trouble neither State nor society any further. But in spite of Tyburn horrors, each week society furnished fresh wretches for the gallows; whilst those who were in custody were almost regarded as fore-doomed and fore-damned."

During the interval which elapsed between Mrs. Fry's short visits to Newgate in 1813, and the resumption of those visits in 1817, together with the inauguration of her special work among the convicts, she was placed in the crucible of trial. Death claimed several relatives; she suffered long-continued illness, and experienced considerable losses of property. All these things refined the gold of her character and discovered its sterling worth. Some natures grow hard and sullen under trial, others faithless and desponding, and yet others narrow and reserved. But the genuine gold of a noble disposition comes out brighter and purer because of untoward events; unsuspected resources are developed, and the higher nobility becomes discernible. So it was with Elizabeth Fry. The constitutional timidity of her nature vanished before the overpowering sense of duty; and literally she looked not at the seen, but at the unseen, in her calculations of Christian service. Yet another part of her discipline was the ingratitude with which many of her efforts were met. This experience is common to all who labour for the public weal; and from an entry in her journal we can but conclude that this "serpent's tooth" pierced her very sorely at times. "A constant lesson to myself is the ingratitude and discontent which I see in many." Many a reformer could echo these words. But the abiding trial seemed to be the remembrance of the loss of her little daughter,