April 1796.

might think proper to attend (any three or more to be a Quorum)
to whom the said Business might be referred and the Committee
so appointed were required to meet and adjourn at pleasure
and from time to time to Report their proceedings to this
Court in compliance therefore with the said Requisition the
following Report is now about to be submitted with great
respect to the attention of the Magistrates. It may be
proper just to state that at the appointment of the Committee
the Court

Resolved that it be an Instruction to the said
Committee to enquire how far the Rules and Orders for
the Management of the New House of Correction have
been observed and are found effectual.

This the Committee considered as the Principal
Object of their Concern and therefore it made the chief
Business of Five several Meetings at which the Rules
and Orders were examined seriatim and the Committee
had the satisfaction of finding that they had been as
much attended to as could reasonably be expected in an
Institution which even now has not had the experience
of more than two Years at the most and cannot yet be
considered as fully Established and Arranged in all its
parts and which has been much embarressed and
perplexed in its proceedings by the Insiduous Malice
of one of its late Inferior Officers and by the impenetrable
dullness or artfully inexplicable Conduct of another Officer
namely the Task Master.

1st. The Committee at their first Meeting holden
on Wednesday the 27th. day of January 1796. found it neces
sary to adopt the following resolution.

That every Prisoner be employed as much as possible
in a state of Separation and that the Governor be directed
to attend to this as a main Principal of this Institution