comparison; and they also objected to my prompt obedience to our warder's commands, as tending to set up an exaggerated and impossible standard of discipline. Between this warder and myself, on the other hand, there soon sprang up a feeling which I might almost describe as one of friendship. Though by the rules of the establishment we could not communicate with one another except upon matters of business, I liked him for his uniform courtesy, kindliness, and forbearance; while I could easily see that he liked me in return, by contrast with the other men who were under his charge. He was one of those persons whom some experience of prisons then and since has led me to believe less rare than most people would imagine—men in whom the dreary life of a prison warder, instead of engendering hardness of heart and cold unsympathetic sternness, has engendered a certain profound tenderness and melancholy of spirit. I grew quite fond of that one honest warder, among so many coarse and criminal faces; and I found, on the other hand, that my fellow-prisoners hated me all the more because, as they expressed it in their own disgusting jargon, I was sucking up to that confounded dog of a barker. It happened once, when I was left for a few minutes alone with the warder, that he made an attempt for a moment, contrary to regulations, to hold a little private conversation with me. "1430," he said in a low voice, hardly moving his lips, for fear of being overlooked, "what is your outside name?"[Pg 96] [Pg 96] I answered quietly, without turning to look at him, "Harold Tait." He gave a little involuntary start. "What!" he cried. "Not him that took a coin from the British Museum?" I bridled up angrily. "I did not take it," I cried with all my soul. "I am innocent, and have been put in here by some terrible error." He was silent for half a second. Then he said musingly, "Sir, I believe you. You are speaking the truth. I will do all I can to make things easy for you." That was all he said then. But from that day forth he always spoke to me in private as "Sir," and never again as "1430." An incident arose at last out of this condition of things which had a very important effect upon my future position.
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