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I met Wilde in his youth, says the "Evening News" representative, after he made his first memorable visit to America. His [...] then was eccentric, but a justification of his doctrines. No man was more perfectly, more beautifully dressed. There was not a tinge [...] the colours of his apparel but completed [...] harmony. His long hair became him; his face was an oval, youthful, fresh, and bright with intelligence. How gross it has become!

Again I met him, sat with him at dinner in the library of the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre at Stratford-on-Avon. Mr Henry Irving and the veteran journalist, Mr George Augustus Sala were also there. The assembly was a brilliant one. The occasion was unveiling of Lord Ronald Gower’s statue of Shakespeare, the beautiful work of art which stands on the green at the front of the theatre facing the winding Avon and the church [...] hidden in the foliage. Irving and Sala made brilliant speeches on the poet and the theatre but when Wilde rose, again superbly but more rationally attired, and delivered an address of sculpture, the assembly of artists, scholars, and historians listened with suppressed breathing, and bowed their heads in acknowledgment of the man's superiority, Wilde was in his zenith then.

The Oscar Wilde who came into the witness box at the Old Bailey to support his charge against the Marquis of Queonsberry was not the same man. Though still precise in his attire and still brilliant in wit, his features had acquired a coarseness that had robbed the man of his intellectual impressiveness.

When Wilde leaned on the rail of the dock on Saturday and heard the jury, in answer to the various charges, six times repeat the word "Guilty!" nothing more appalling than the hopelessness which crept into his sunken eyes have I ever looked upon. The lines visibly multiplied in the man's face, his huge body seemed to shrink into littleness, and as the jailer touched him on the shoulder he reeled in bewilderment.

During the first month, while on the wheel, Wild will sleep on the plank bed, a bare board raised a few inches above the floor and supplied with sheets—clean sheets are given to each prisoner—two rugs, and a coverlet, but no mattress. His diet will be—Cocoa and bread for breakfast at 7 30. Dinner, at noon, one day bacon and beans, another soup, another cold Australian meal and another brown flour suet puddings, with the last three repeated twice a week, potatoes with every dinner; and tea at 5 30.

After he has finished his spell on the wheel he will be put to some industrial employment [...] not play-writing, although it might be the most profitable for the prison department, but probably post bag-making, tailoring, or merely picking of oakum. He will exercise in the open air daily for an hour, walking with the rest of his ward in Indian file, no talking allowed.

He will be allowed no communication with outside, except by special permission, until he has completed three months of his sentence and then he may write and receive one letter, and he visited for twenty minutes by three friends, but in the visiting cell, separated from them by wire blinds and in the presence of a warder. After the first letter and visit the same may be repeated at intervals of three months. But all these concessions are dependent first upon industry aud next upon conduct. The pla[...] bed cannot be escaped from until a certain number of marks, awarded only for work done and in the same way letters and visits are accorded. Wildo will attend chapel every morning at 9 a m, and twice on Sundays. He will be visited, if he wishes it, by the chaplain and as often as he likes also daily by the Governor or Deputy Governor.

In the "Nineteenth Century" Wilde once wrote:— "The things people say of a man do not alter a man. He is what he is. Public opinion is of no value whatever. After all even in prison a man can be quite free. His soul can be free. His personality can be not troubled. He can be at peace."

When Wilde heard his sentence the despair depicted in his shrinking face, as the crowded Court rose and leaned towards him, was terrible to see.

"May I say nothing, my lord?" asked the distraught man, his brain reeling, and his great intellect deserting him.

"No!" was the stern rebuff.

No! the brilliant wit was doomed to the silence of solitary imprisonment, the man of fashion was condemned to shorn locks and the convict’s garb, the voluptuary to the labour of the treadmill, the poet to the maddening torture of two years hard labour.

One solitary voice raised the cry of "Shame!" to be rebuked instantly by an unpitying silence.

TWO PICTURES.

I met Wilde in his youth, says THE EVENING NEWS representative, after he made his first memorable visit to America. His attire then was eccentric, but a justification of his doctrines. No man was more perfectly, more beautifully dressed. There was not a tinge in the colours of his apparel but completed the harmony. His long hair become; his face was an oval, youthful, fresh, and bright with intelligence. How gross it has become?

Again I met him, sat with him at dinner in the library of the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre at Stratford-on-Avon. Mr. Henry Irving and the veteran journalist, Mr. George Augustus Sala were also there. The assembly was a brilliant one. The occasion was the unveiling of Sir Ronald Gower’s statue of Shakespeare, the beautiful work of art which stands on the green at the front of the theatre, facing the winding Avon and the church half-hidden in the foliage. Irving and Sala made brilliant speeches on the poet and the theatre, but when Wilde rose, again superbly, but more rationally attired, and delivered an address on sculpture, the assembly of artists, scholars, and histrions listened with suppressed breathing and bowed their heads in acknowledgment of the man’s superiority. Wilde was in his zenith then.

AND A THIRD.

The Oscar Wilde who came into the witness box at the Old Bailey to support his charge against the Marquis of Queenbserry was not the same man. Though still precise in his attire and still brilliant in wit his features had acquired a coarseness that had robbed the man of his intellectual impressiveness.

When Wilde leaned on the rail of the dock on Saturday and heard the jury, in answer to the various charges, six times repeat the word "Guilty!" nothing more appalling than the hopelessness which crept into his sunken eyes have I ever looked upon. The lines visibly multiplied in the man’s face, his huge body seemed to shrink into littleness, and as the gaoler touched him on the shoulder he reeled in bewilderment.

WHAT WILDE WILL DO NOW.

After sentence on Saturday Wilde was conveyed in a depressed and nervous condition to the cell at Newgate, and immediately after, when the warrants authorising his detention for two years had been prepared, was taken in the prison van to Holloway. Here he found the reception warder waiting for him to deprive him of all loose cash and valuables; he was stripped to his shirt and placed before an officer, who proceeded to "take his description;" to write down in the prison ledgers a minute account of his appearance, his distinctive marks, the colour of his eyes, hair, complexion, any peculiarities, a broken finger, tattoo marks, moles, and so forth. Not being an old hand, having no previous convictions against him, he was not measured under the Bertillon system.

After the "description" was recorded, a matter of 10 or 15 minutes, he passed into the bath-room, where a hot bath awaited him, and while he was refreshing himself his shirt, the last vestige of his days of freedom, was removed. Emerging from the water he found a full suit of prison clothes ready for him, from the under linen to the loose shoes and hideous Scottish cap. The clothes are of the well-known dirty drab colour, plentifully adorned with broad arrows.

Being a large-framed man and of superior station, these clothes were perfectly new. Then the rules were read to him, and he was marched to a cell in the body of the prison, and shortly afterwards ate his first real prison meal—an allowance of thin porridge, the true skilly, and a small brown loaf.

OFF TO PENTONVILLE.

From Holloway he will pass on today to Pentonville, close by, the prison for convicted prisoners, as Holloway takes only those awaiting their trial. The process of reception will be repeated, one part of it being very minute and particular—that of the medical officer’s investigation. The exact state of his health will have an important bearing upon his prison life.

If he is passed sound and fit for first-class hard labour, he will be compelled to take his first month’s exercise on the treadwheel; six hours daily making an ascent of 6,000ft., 20 minutes on continuously and then five minutes’ rest. The necessity for close medical examination is obvious before a man is subjected to this labour, and Wilde will be ausculted and tapped and thoroughly overhauled before the decision is made.

THE PLANK BED.

During the first month, while on the wheel, Wilde will sleep on the plank bed, a bare board raised a few inches above the floor and supplied with sheets—clean sheets are given to each prisoner—two rugs, and a coverlet, but no mattress. His diet will be—

Cocoa and bread for breakfast at 7.30.

Dinner, at noon, one day bacon and beans, another soup, another cold Australian meat, and another brown flour suet puddings, with the last three repeated twice a week, potatoes with every dinner. And

Tea at 5.30 as already stated.

After he has finished his spell on the wheel he will be put to some industrial employment, not play-writing, although it might be the most profitable for the prison department, but probably post bag-making, tailoring, or merely picking of oakum. He will exercise in the open air daily for an hour, walking with the rest of his ward in Indian file, no talking allowed.

He will be allowed no communication with outside, except by special permission, until he has completed three months of his sentence, and then he may write and receive one letter, and be visited for twenty minutes by three friends, but in the visiting cell, separated from them by wire blinds and in the presence of a warder. After the first letter and visit the same may be repeated at intervals of three months. But all these concessions are dependent first upon industry and next upon conduct. The plank bed cannot be escaped from until a certain number of marks, awarded only for work done, and in the same way letters and visits are accorded. Wilde will attend chapel every morning at 9 a.m. and twice on Sundays. He will be visited, if he wishes it, by the chaplain, and as often as he likes, also daily by the Governor or Deputy Governor.

HE MAY EARN 10s.

A Government Inspector will visit him once a month and hear any representations or complaints, and the Visiting Committee of London Magistrates call frequently at the prison for the same laudable purpose. On release, Wilde, if he has worked well and behaved well will have earned the magnificent sum of 10s., which he can have all at once or it will be doled out to [...]