I have approached succeeding Home Secretaries upon this matter till I am tired; succeeding Home Secretaries have sent memorandums and recommendations to courts of summary jurisdiction till, I expect, they are tired, for generally they have had no effect in mitigating the evil.
Magistrates have the power to grant time for the payment of fines, but it is optional, not imperative.

It is high time for a change, and surely it will come, for the absurdity cannot continue.
Surely every English man and woman who possesses a settled home ought to have, and must have, the legal right of a few days' grace in which to pay his or her fine.

And every youthful offender ought to have the same right, also, even if he paid by instalments.
But at present it is so much easier, and therefore so much better, to thrust the underworld, youthful and adult, into prison and have done with them, than it is to pursue a sane but a little bit troublesome method that would keep thousands of the poor from ever entering prison..