This is a meeting of the governors of the Rasphuis, a prison and correctional institution for men. Beggars, vagrants and petty criminals shred Brazilian hardwood to make pigment for paint. A sign in Latin above the entrance reads ‘Wild animals must be tamed’. As they can in the Spinhuis, the prison for women who have gone off the rails, if they pay a few pennies the public may come and look at the inmates.