But that money was made in the Pen I had direct evidence, for I was cell-mate quite a time with the Third Hall-man.  He had over sixteen dollars.  He used to count his money every night after nine o’clock, when we were locked in.  Also, he used to tell me each night what he would do to me if I gave away on him to the other hall-men.  You see, he was afraid of being robbed, and danger threatened him from three different directions.  There were the guards.  A couple of them might jump upon him, give him a good beating for alleged insubordination, and throw him into the “solitaire” (the dungeon); and in the mix-up that sixteen dollars of his would take wings.  Then again, the First Hall-man could have taken it all away from him by threatening to dismiss him and fire him back to hard labor in the prison-yard.  And yet again, there were the ten of us who were ordinary hall-men.  If we got an inkling of his wealth, there was a large liability, some quiet day, of the whole bunch of us getting him into a corner and dragging him down.  Oh, we were wolves, believe me—­just like the fellows who do business in Wall Street.

He had good reason to be afraid of us, and so had I to be afraid of him.  He was a huge, illiterate brute, an ex-Chesapeake-Bay-oyster-pirate, an “ex-con” who had done five years in Sing Sing, and a general all-around stupidly carnivorous beast.  He used to trap sparrows that flew into our hall through the open bars.  When he made a capture, he hurried away with it into his cell, where I have seen him crunching bones and spitting out feathers as he bolted it raw.  Oh, no, I never gave away on him to the other hall-men.  This is the first time I have mentioned his sixteen dollars.

But I grafted on him just the same.  He was in love with a woman prisoner who was confined in the “female department.”  He could neither read nor write, and I used to read her letters to him and write his replies.  And I made him pay for it, too.  But they were good letters.  I laid myself out on them, put in my best licks, and furthermore, I won her for him; though I shrewdly guess that she was in love, not with him, but with the humble scribe.  I repeat, those letters were great.

Another one of our grafts was “passing the punk.”  We were the celestial messengers, the fire-bringers, in that iron world of bolt and bar.  When the men came in from work at night and were locked in their cells, they wanted to smoke.  Then it was that we restored the divine spark, running the galleries, from cell to cell, with our smouldering punks.  Those who were wise, or with whom we did business, had their punks all ready to light.  Not every one got divine sparks, however.  The guy who refused to dig up, went sparkless and smokeless to bed.  But what did we care?  We had the immortal cinch on him, and if he got fresh, two or three of us would pitch on him and give him “what-for.”