Since the abolition of flogging in the services, the use of the cat is now restricted to certain classes of offenders in military prisons (Army Act 1881, § 133).
Prisons.The prisons of France, some of them attached to the ministry of the interior, are complex in their classification.
Cellular imprisonment was, however, partially adopted for persons awaiting trial., Central prisons, in which prisoners lived and worked in association, had been in existence from the commencement of the i9th century.
These prisons received all sentenced to short terms of imprisonment, the long-term convicts going to the bagnes (the great convict prisons at the arsenals of Rochefort, Brest and Toulon), while in 1851 transportation to penal colonies was adopted.
There were, however, but few prisons in France adapted for the cellular system, and the process of reconstruction has been slow, In 1898 the old Paris prisons of Grande-Roquette, Saint-Plagie and Mazas were demolished, and to replace them a large prison with 1500 cells was erected at Fresnes-ls-Rungis.