It was accordingly resolved to endeavor to better the condition of the prisoners while at the same time preventing as much as possible their corruption by indiscriminate herding together. As far back as 1849, M. Dufaure advocated the keeping apart of prévenus and of those condemned for minor offences. But it was not till 1875 that a law was passed decreeing the separation of those serving sentences of imprisonment of less than a year. The department of the Seine endeavored to carry out the requirements of this law on as large and complete a scale as possible, and accordingly laid the foundations of these two large penal establishments outside the walls of the city. Those at Fresnes may be considered as model prisons; it has even been suggested that the comfort of the inmates has been almost too closely considered, and that, with the exception of the guards and the jailers, these buildings suggest the model cheap lodgings of modern practical philanthropy. The architect had taken the greatest care to assure the well-being of his involuntary clients, their health and personal cleanliness; their cells--more spacious than usual--have hardwood floors, the walls are painted and varnished, as are the table, the chair, and the iron bedstead provided with softer bedding; the latest mechanical and electrical appliances are to be found in these very modern dungeons. The extent of the mental and moral amelioration of the Parisian criminals that will follow the introduction of this new régime will doubtless be profitable to contemplate.
In addition to its various prisons, the department of the Seine maintains two very large establishments for beggars, paupers, vagabonds, and the wretched of every description, whether they have or have not records approved by the police. The largest of these _Dépôts de Mendicité_, that at Nanterre, is at once a prison and a hospital; it contains three thousand inmates of both sexes, and cost some twelve millions of francs. Of the five sections into which it is divided, the first, reserved for voluntary mendicants, is the only one which contains prisoners, properly speaking, men in one quarter and women in another. The other sections, each divided likewise into male and female quarters, are devoted, the second, to voluntary patients whose antecedents are known; the third, to those whose antecedents are doubtful or unknown; the fourth, to the impotent, infirm, paralytic, and septuagenarians; the fifth is the hospital proper. The inhabitants of these different sections are distinguished from each other, the men by the color of their woollen caps, and the women by the little trimming of imitation lace in theirs. The Dépôt de Villers-Cotterets, which occupies the buildings and dependencies of the celebrated château built by François I, on an admirable site, was at first a prison, devoted to vagabonds and beggars of all ages and conditions; since 1889 it has been a _Maison de Retraite_, an asylum to which are admitted only the aged and infirm indigent whose past has been without reproach. The number of these peaceable inmates is about a thousand men and half as many women.