Read Ebook: Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine Vol. 60 No. 373 November 1846 by Various

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 407 lines and 89163 words, and 9 pages

A reform in the military department, recommended by Sir A. Burnes, caused immense bitterness and ill-blood amongst the chiefs, whose retinues were compulsorily diminished, the men who were to be retained, and those who were to be dismissed, being selected by a British officer. This was looked upon as an outrageous insult and grievous humiliation. The reduction was effected, also, in a harsh and arbitary manner, without consideration for the pride of the chiefs and warriors, by whom all these offences were treasured up, to be one day bloodily revenged. Other innovations speedily followed and increased their discontent; until at last they were reduced to so deplorable a position that they waited in a body upon Shah Shuja to complain of it. The Shah imprudently replied, that he was king by title only, not by power, and that the chiefs were cowards, and could do nothing. These words Mohan Lal believes were not spoken to stimulate the chiefs to open rebellion, but merely to induce them to such acts as might convince the English of the bad policy of their reforms and other measures. But the Shah had miscalculated the effect of his dangerous hint. After the interview with him, at the end of September 1841, the chiefs assembled, and sealed an engagement, written on the leaves of the Koran, binding themselves to rebel against the existing government, as the sole way to annihilate British influence in Kabul. Mohan Lal was informed of this plot, and reported it to Sir A. Burnes, who attached little importance to it, and refused to permit the seizure of the Koran, whence the names of the conspirators might have been learned. It has been frequently stated, that neither Burnes nor MacNaghten had timely information of the discontent and conspiracy of the chiefs. Mohan Lal affirms the contrary, and supports his assertion by extracts from letters written by those gentlemen. Pride of power, he says, and an unfortunate spirit of rivalry, prevented them from taking the necessary measures to meet the outbreak. Sir A. Burnes thought that to be on the alert would show timidity, whilst carelessness of the alarming reports then afloat would prove intrepidity, and produce favourable results. But it was not the moment for such speculations. A circular letter was secretly sent round to all the Durrani and Persian chiefs in Kabul and the suburbs, falsely stating that a plan was on foot to seize them and send them to India, whither Sir W. MacNaghten was about to proceed as governor of Bombay. The authors of this atrocious forgery were afterwards discovered. They were three Afghans of bad character and considerable cunning, who had been employed by the Vazir, by the envoy, and by Sir A. Burnes. Their object was to produce a revolt, in which they might make themselves conspicuous as friends of the English, and so obtain reward and distinction. They had been wont to derive advantage from revolutions and outbreaks, and were eager for another opportunity of making money. Their selfish and abominable device was the spark to the train. It caused a prompt explosion. The chiefs again assembled, resolved upon instant action, and fixed upon its plan. It was decided to begin by an attack upon the houses of Sir A. Burnes and the other English officers resident in the city. For fear of discovery, not a moment was to be lost. The following day, the 2d of November, was to witness the outbreak.

And now, at the eleventh hour, fresh intimations of the approaching danger were conveyed to those whom it threatened. Two persons informed Sir A. Burnes of it; and one of the conspirators more than hinted it to Mohan Lal, who had boasted to him that the Ghilzais were pacified by Major Macgregor, and that Sir Robert Sale was on his victorious march to Jellalabad. The conspirator laughed. "To-morrow morning," he said, "the very door you now sit at will be in flames of fire; and yet still you pride yourselves in saying that you are safe!"

The disastrous occurrences in Afghanistan, on and subsequently to the 2d of November 1841, are so recent, so well-known, and have been so much written about, that any thing beyond a passing reference to them is here unnecessary. Mohan Lal's account of the deaths of Sir A. Burnes, Charles Burnes, Sir W. MacNaghten, and Shah Shuja, is interesting, as are also some details of his own escapes and adventures during the insurrection. From the roof of his house he witnessed the attack upon that of Sir A. Burnes, and the death of Lieutenant H. Burnes, who slew six Afghans before he himself was cut to pieces. Sir Alexander was murdered without resistance, having previously tied his cravat over his eyes, in order not to see the blows that put an end to his existence. Mohan Lal himself narrowly escaped death at the hands of the man who subsequently murdered Shah Shuja; but he was rescued by an Afghan friend, and concealed in a harem. Afterwards, whilst prisoner to Akhbar Khan, he did good service in sending information to the English generals and political agents, and finally in negotiating the release of the Kabul captives. For all these matters we refer our readers to the closing chapters of his book, and return to Dost Mohammed.

On his arrival at Calcutta, the Amir was treated by Lord Auckland with great attention and respect, an income of three lakhs of rupees was allotted to him, and he was taken to see the curiosities of the city, the naval and military stores, &c. All these things greatly struck him, and he was heard to say, that had he known the extraordinary power and resources of the English, he would never have opposed them. After a while, his health sufferred from the Calcutta climate; he became greatly alarmed about himself, and begged to be allowed to join his family at Loodianah. He was sent to the upper provinces, and afterwards to the hills, where the temperature was cool and somewhat similar to that of his own country. During the Kabul insurrection he managed to keep up a communication with his son Akhbar, whom he strongly advised to destroy the English by every means in his power.

When it at last became evident that the feeble and talentless Sadozais were unable to hold the reins of power in Afghanistan, or to contend, with any chance of success, against the energy and influence of the Barakzai chiefs, Dost Mohammed was released, and allowed to return to his own country. On his way he concluded a secret treaty of alliance with Sher Singh, the Maharajah of the Punjaub, and from Lahore was escorted by the Sikhs to the Khaibar pass, where Akhbar Khan and other Afghan chiefs received him. The Amir's exultation at again ascending his throne knew no bounds. Unschooled by adversity, he very soon recommenced his old system of extortion, and made himself so unpopular, that he was once fired at, but escaped. He now enjoys his authority and the superiority of his family, fearless of invasion from West or East.

Although Akhbar Khan, of all the Amir's sons, has the greatest influence in Afghanistan, and renown out of it, his elder brother, Afzal Khan, is, we are informed, greatly his superior in judgment and nobility of character. Mohan Lal predicts a general commotion in Kabul when Dost Mohammed dies. If any one of his brothers, the chiefs of Qandhar, or Sultan Mohammed Khan, the ex-chief of Peshavar, be then alive, he will attempt to seize Kabul, and many of the Afghan nobles, some even of the Amir's sons, will lend him their support against Akhbar Khan. The popular candidate, however, the favourite of the people, of the chiefs, and of his relations, the Barakzais, is Afzal Khan. Akhbar will be supported by his brothers--the sons, that is to say, of his own mother as well as of the Amir. Perhaps the whole territory of Kabul will be divided into small independent principalities, governed by the different sons of Dost Mohammed. At any rate, there can be little doubt that at his death wars and intrigues, plunderings and assassinations, will again distract the country. The crown that was won by the crimes of the father, will, in all probability, be shattered and pulled to pieces by the dissensions and rivalry of the children.

FOOTNOTES:

ON THE OPERATION OF THE ENGLISH POOR-LAWS.

The subject matter of this article must be suggestive, rather than affirmative. Even at this time of day, it would be presumptuous to take up a commanding or decided position. The old system was rotten. The good it contained was choked up with weeds; the pruning-knife has been applied unsparingly; and it is to be feared that good wood has been cut away. New arrangements have been devised with practical shrewdness, to displace clearly recognised evils; but, with these practical improvements, certain economic theories have been speculatively, tried; and it is likely that evils have sprung up; so that those who proclaim so loudly that every part of the new arrangements is either naught or vicious, and those who affirm that the old methods were all good, are both remote from the truth, which, probably, lies somewhere between the two.

The subject being set apart for inquiry, the question arises--How can a subject which has so many phases be advantageously considered; to whom must we go for information; and to what matters should the attention be chiefly directed? It is to these questions this article will attempt to provide answers. To the first question--To whom must we go for information?--the answer is obvious. To all who are engaged in the administration of the law, and chiefly to those who have to do with those departments where evils may be supposed to exist. And, in order to answer the second, the subject must be divided into classes, and the mode of operation of the law in each must be sketched. The reader will then be able to see for himself, and judge whether the matters referred to are not those which most imperatively demand inquiry.

The several parishes, townships, chapelries, and hamlets of England and Wales, whether grouped into Unions or not, may be usefully distributed into three classes.

The following diagram will explain this classification:

These divisions of territory may be regarded from different points of view. They may be seen through the media of statute-books, reports, returns, and statistics; or they may be actually surveyed. Each course has its peculiar dangers. The mind, occupied with matters of detail and routine occurrences, is apt to lose in comprehensiveness as much as it gains in minute exactness. To avoid this danger the mind must soar as the facts accumulate. It must regard them, sometimes from the height of one theory, and sometimes from the height of another. For the mind becomes tinged with the hue of whatever is frequently presented to it. Opinions even are hereditary. And every set of facts leads to a different conclusion, according to the texture of the minds they pass through. Refer to the facts connected with the condition of the poor, which have been proclaimed during the last few years; and then reflect to what contradictory opinions they have led. The man of strong benevolent feelings deduces one inference. The politico-economical theorist deduces another. And the man of practice and experience is as likely to be deluded as either. He sees destitution so frequently connected with imprudence, laziness, and crime, that he is apt to believe that the union is indissoluble. His mind has never embraced a general idea, or traced effects to causes, or distinguished them, the one from the other. And in this matter, where the causes and effects are so complicated, and entangled by their mutual reaction, he is likely to be at fault. Then the man of pure benevolence sees only the pain, and demands only the means of immediate relief. And the political economist tells us, "That the law which would enforce charity can fix no limits, either to the ever-increasing wants of a poverty which itself has created, or to the insatiable desires and demands of a population which itself hath corrupted and led astray."

In the First Class, the parishes are large, thinly populated, and situated generally in rural districts. In some cases, the Union includes a country town; the neighbouring parishes and hamlets being connected with it. The total number of parishes may be eighteen or twenty. In other cases, the Union consists of about twenty-five parishes, townships, hamlets, and chapelries. In some instances, the population of the parishes are collected into so many villages, which are distant from each other. In others, the entire surface of the country is sprinkled thinly with cottages. The communications are by high-roads, and muddy lanes, over high hills, and through bogs and marshes, and by bridle-roads and footpaths--

"O'er muirs and mosses many, O."

In each of these Unions, the management of the relief fund is confided to a Board, consisting of resident rate-payers, and resident country magistrates. The former are guardians by election, and the latter ex-officio. The Board is completed by the addition of the churchwardens and overseers. The chairman is generally the most distinguished, and the vice-chairman the most active man in the Union. The chairman regulates the proceedings of the Board, and ascertains its resolutions. The clerk records them. The relief which applicants are to receive, is determined by the Board; except that which is given by certain officers in cases of "sudden and urgent necessity." The management of the Union-house is invested in the master--a paid officer. His duties are ascertained and fixed. He is liable to dismissal by the joint resolution of the Poor-Law Commissioners and the Guardians, or by the order of the Commissioners alone. It is also the duty of the master to attend to such cases of destitution as may be presented at the Union-House gate; and, if their necessities be of a sudden and urgent character, to admit them into the house. It may be remarked here, that information is wanted upon this point. The question is not, by what general term may the cases be designated, whether sudden or urgent, but what the circumstances of the cases really are, which are so relieved. The answers to the question would throw light upon the relation subsisting between a strict work-house system and the increase of vagrancy. To continue. The sick poor are confided to the care of the medical officer; and the out-door relief is chiefly administered by the relieving-officer. His duties in rural Unions are as follows:--To pay or deliver such amounts of money or food as the Board may have ordered the poor to receive, at the villages, hamlets, and cottages where they may reside. He must visit the poor at their homes. He receives applications for relief; and when the necessity is sudden and urgent, he relieves the case promptly with food. He must report upon the circumstances of each case, and keep accounts. For neglect of duty, he is liable to penal consequences, and to dismissal, in the same way as the master. The average number of parishes, townships, and hamlets committed to the care of the relieving-officer may be about twenty. The reader may be able, from his local knowledge, to picture this Union, and give it a name.

The Union then consists of twenty parishes. The Union-house is pretty central, and situated near a small market-town. The meetings of the Board are held in the Union-house, and upon the market-day; because then the guardians, churchwardens, and overseers, after having transacted their private business, may conveniently perform their public duties. At the last meeting of the Board of Guardians, certain poor persons appeared before them, and were ordered to be relieved with money or food, at a specific rate, and for a specified time. The relieving-officer resides in that part of the Union from whence he can reach the most distant and opposite points with nearly equal facility. He divides his district into rounds, and each occupies the greatest portion of a day. At the end of each week he will have visited the whole of the twenty parishes.

The number of medical officers in a Union varies. In some cases, where there are two relieving-officers, there are four medical officers. The medical officer resides within the limits of the Union. He is not prevented from attending to his private practice, and he does not therefore reside in a central position, or at the nearest point to his pauper patients; he is supplied with a list of persons who are in receipt of relief, and he is bound to attend these without an order; he must also attend to cases upon the receipt of a written order from the relieving-officer or the overseer; he regulates the diet of his patients, and he is paid by a salary, and by fees in certain cases.

There are contradictory opinions respecting the efficiency of this system. Some say that the amount of remuneration is inadequate to insure qualified persons, and others that the qualifications are secured by the requisition of recognised diplomas.

If we inquire of those among the peasantry who have never received parochial relief, or even of the yeomanry, we find that in many districts, and especially those of which we are now speaking, it is a difficult matter to obtain immediate medical aid; and if this consideration have any weight, the system would appear satisfactory, providing always the overseers perform their duty when applied to. It would be desirable to ascertain whether there are any restrictions in the issue of medical orders. As regards relieving the poor with food, there are many who say, that, in so doing, the very evil is created which we are endeavouring to destroy. But this is not said with respect to medical relief. The labouring man with his family may earn an average wage of from 7s. to 12s. per week. The most prudent cannot save much, and those savings are invested in the purchase of a stack of wood, a sack of meal, a crop of potatoes, a stye of pigs, or a cow. His savings might enable him to provide food for his family during illness, but they would be totally insufficient to pay for medicine and medical aid. It would be desirable to ascertain where and to what extent medical clubs and dispensaries exist, and what means the agricultural labourer, in thinly populated districts, possesses for obtaining gratuitous medical aid.

It would be well, too, if Boards of Guardians would remember that their duties have not ended when they have disposed of the cases on each board-day. They have to do with pauperism, not only as it exists to-day, but as it may exist next month or next year; and therefore they have to do with its causes, as well as its existing results. This truth is just now occupying the minds of statesmen, and it is to be hoped that it may receive the attention of Boards of Guardians. Sanatory regulations will decrease pauperism. Many men have been destroyed, and their families pauperised, by uncovered sewers in thickly populated lanes and alleys; and much disease has been engendered by the want of facilities for cleanliness. And so also has much pauperism been engendered by the drain upon the resources of the poor man during a long illness. Could not this be remedied, and that without weakening the feeling of independence? And why might not a Board of Guardians be allowed, or compelled, to contribute a given sum to any dispensary or medical club which may be governed by certain rules duly certified?

We must now refer to the churchwardens and overseers of the several parishes of this rural Union. The question with respect to them is, do they receive the applications of the poor in their respective parishes, and deal with them in the same way as the relieving-officer? It would not be a sufficient answer to quote acts of parliament, or lists of duties. It is doubtless of importance to know that, according to law, the duty of relieving in cases of sudden and urgent necessity is still reserved to the overseer. But it is of equal importance to ascertain whether, in those extensive or thinly populated parishes where the relieving-officer may reside many a weary mile distant from the cottage of the destitute, any check, or hinderance, or heavy discouragement has been offered to the overseer in his attempt to perform his duty. We can easily conceive the farmer overseer, before 1834, riding over the fields of his parish, and meeting one of the poor cottagers, at once relieving him with a piece of money, and taking no further note of the circumstance than was necessary to prevent his forgetting to repay himself. And we can understand how the same overseer, under the new system, when men to whom he has been accustomed to look up with deference are united with him in the administration of relief, may not trouble himself to inquire into, or care to exercise, the rights reserved to him. Or he may find that he has something more to do than merely to enter the amount in his pocket-book. He may have to report the case to the relieving-officer, or to defend it at the Board--neither of which acts his literary habits, his opportunities, his patience, or his ability to speak before the magnates of his district in Board assembled, may dispose him to perform. In other cases, where these considerations may have no weight, the overseer may be of opinion, since paid officers have been appointed to do the duty, and are paid to do it, that they are the proper persons to perform it.

In thus referring to the duties of overseers, it must not be supposed that a recurrence to the old system is aimed at. It is a common opinion that the Union system is diametrically opposed to the old parochial system. And it seems to be too generally thought that relief should be given through paid agency. But this is not so. The power to relieve, in cases of sudden and urgent necessity, still rests with the overseers. But the law has deprived the overseer of the power to give permanent relief. It will not allow him to give a regular weekly allowance. The question the overseer has to do with is not whether labourer Miles shall receive, for a number of consecutive weeks or months, a certain sum, but whether he should not receive relief at this moment, his necessities being sudden and urgent. The question of permanent relief is no longer a subject of personal controversy and irritation between the labourer and the farmer. It is now a question between the labourer and the Board. What he shall receive no longer depends upon the will of a single person, but upon the collective will of a number so great, that personal partialities and prejudices can scarcely have place. The system, in this respect, assures justice alike to the rate-payer and the indigent poor. It stands between the poor man and the overseer; and also between the overseer and the sturdy threatening vagrant.

But it is desirable to know whether the dereliction of duty by overseers has been of frequent occurrence, and whether there has been any want of care or disposition on the part of the authorities to facilitate its exercise. That the relief given must be duly recorded and accounted for, is quite clear. Now, do the means for doing this equal those given to the relieving-officer, who requires them less? Then, again, have arrangements been duly made to enable overseers to relieve in food? Is the loaf or the meat at hand? Can it be had from the nearest shop? Or must it be brought from the store of the contractor, who cannot always reside in the next village? In fact, must the destitute person wait for the periodical visit of the relieving-officer, and is the duty of the overseer thus made a superfluity?

It is likely that the dweller in cities may not sufficiently estimate the importance of this topic. In a populous city, however sudden the casualty may be to which a fellow-creature may fall a victim, the means of relief are within a stone's-throw from the spot. But the case is different in that wide expanse of level country which opens to the view of the pedestrian as he gains the summit of the hill. The plain is dotted with solitary cottages, hamlets, and villages. The town is just perceptible in the distance. But its hum and its chimes are unheard. The Union-house loses its barrack-like appearance by its remoteness. He descends, and its "goes on his way." He hears the voices of children, the song of birds; and he sees cottages "embosomed" in trees, and those pictures which pastoral poets have so loved to paint, pass in panoramic order before him. He enters the cottage door; he sees the dampness of the walls; he feels the clayey coldness of the floors, and observes the signs of poverty. While pondering upon these things, sensation vacates its office, and imagination rules in the ascendant; material images fade away. Now the fields, the trees, and the entire air become covered and filled with drifting snow. Or,

"The stillness of these frosty plains, Their utter stillness, and the silent grace Of yon ethereal summits, white with snow,

Or the winds howl, the biting sharpness of the frosty air nips the joints and shrivels the flesh, and the smoking smouldering fire has no power to control the winds which rush across the room. The scene changes. The lowlands are flooded, and the waters reach to, and stagnate at the cottage door. The rains descend; the air is saturated with water; it chills the frame; the heart beats languidly, and the soul of man stoops to the deadening influence of the elements. Agues, rheumatism, and fevers prevail. The hardships of the season bear down old and young; for the want of sufficient or nutritious food has shorn them of their strength.

Upon awakening from this trance, "which was not all a dream," and reflecting how far aid is distant, even if it can be obtained from the nearest overseer, how forcibly must the thought occur--what numbers suffer and die whose suffering is unrelieved and unknown! If our pedestrian learn nothing from his trip for health and pleasure more than this, he will have learnt enough to satisfy him that the point we have directed his attention to, viz. that the means of relief in rural districts should be made as ample as possible; and that, therefore, the right and duty of the overseers to relieve promptly should be encouraged and zealously guarded.

Reference must now be made to the notorious "Prohibitory Order." And in doing so, it is not to the order itself, either in its original or amended form, that the following remarks are especially made, but to the practices which owe their origin to the enactments of the Poor-Law Amendment Act, to the Utopian expectations of many, that a strict work-house test would destroy pauperism, and to the explanations and reports of the Commissioners themselves. The following is the prohibitory in its latest and most humanised form:--

The fifth exception, relating to widows, is accompanied with a course of reasoning directed against its application; and as it is to be feared that the practice engendered by a former order, in which this exception had no place, may have become habitual, this exception will be treated as if it did not exist. Especial inquiries ought to be made, in order to ascertain whether widows with children are generally allowed out-door relief.

The immediate effect of this system of relief is a diminution of expenditure. But we must look beyond the immediate effects. It is to be feared that great politico-social evils result from this system. They have been somewhat reduced in number, perhaps, by the new prohibitory order. But it is too probable that the original wound has left a scar. The evils are not on the surface, and strike the mind at intervals. Perhaps we may be struck with the fact, that our prisons are filled with individuals who have been committed for slight offences, and for short periods; and it may casually appear, that the work-house has something to do with it. Then the question may occur, why the ordinary accommodation for wayfarers in the casual wards of work-houses has become insufficient or less ample than formerly? Or, when travelling, we may see whole families creeping along the roads apparently without object or aim; and if, after giving them a coin, you ask them where they are going to, and why they are going? you will be struck with the vagueness of their replies. Wherever you meet them, you find they are going from this place to that; and if you were to meet them every day for a twelvemonth, the answers would always be as indefinite. At another time, we may be deeply concerned in the subject of prison discipline; and while studying reports, returns, and dietaries, the subject of workhouse discipline may become associated with it, and induce comparisons. And it may come to our knowledge, that there is a vast body of persons to whom it is a matter of indifference whether they are inmates of a prison or a workhouse. Or the mind may soar above the dull, cold, field of politics, and extend its researches to the pure regions of morality, leaving the questions of science for those of philosophy; and then it will appear that there are causes in operation, and results constantly flowing, which escape the "economic" eyes of assistant Commissioners.

But we must avoid generalities. We still retain our original ground, viz. the rural Union, with its large area and its thinly scattered population. The reader must accompany us to the rural Union, where the spirit of the prohibitory order exercises its most baneful influence.

We saw the relieving-officer performing his round of duties. The poor were assembled at the cottage door. Two classes of applicants were then given. We must now, however, look deeper into human nature. The destitute consist of the virtuous and the vicious, the vulgar and the refined. There stands an able-bodied man with his able-bodied wife, and his large healthy family. His weekly wages amount to nine shillings per week. If he loses a week's work he is destitute. He is now making an application to the relieving-officer. But it is useless. He must walk to the Union, and become an inmate, where his dinner awaits him. The man who now approaches the officer is like the last, able-bodied and out of work; but, unlike him, he has an idle, unthrifty, drunken wife. He is always trembling on the confines of destitution; and the instant he is without work he is on the brink of starvation. His spirit is broken. His children are dirty and ragged, and appear emaciated without disease. He, too, must enter the Union. The next is a hard-featured man;--

"A savage wildness round him hung As of a dweller out of doors; In his whole figure, and his mien, A savage character was seen Of mountains and of dreary moors."

He does not seem to care whether relief is granted or not; and we may hear him say, "I don't want relief for myself, I can get my living somehow or other--but my wife and child musn't starve. I shan't go to the Union--I shall be off--and catch me who can."--In the cottage, a woman is seated with her children, whose husband has done that which the other has threatened to do. She may be industrious or idle, but she cannot support herself, thus suddenly thrown upon her own resources. Let us hope that she is allowed the benefit of the amended order.--There is the man whose children are approaching the state of womanhood or manhood. He has work to do, and he does it. He could manage to eke out a subsistence for himself--for his habits are simple and frugal; but his children are now a sore trial to him. His daughter has returned to his cottage with a child of shame. She has erred, but she cannot be turned from his door. She has tried to make the father contribute to the support of the child, but without success. Poor ignorant creature, instead of taking a competent witness with her, when she asked the man to assist her, she was too anxious to hide her shame. Instead of putting questions to him, in order "to get up" the corroborative evidence, she was too apt to spoil all by passionate upbraidings. And then, when she appeared before their worships the justices, she was too much abashed or excited, to enable her to develope those latent powers of examination and cross-examination which the law supposes her to possess. Those who have witnessed those humiliating proceedings in our petty courts of justice, and seen the magistrate at one moment kindly acting as counsel for the girl, then falling back to his position as judge, and observed the evident helplessness of the girl, must have left the court with the impression that the whole affair is a disgusting farce. She departs without redress. The "corroborative evidence" is declared insufficient. She goes to her father's cottage. His heart compels him to give her shelter, and a place at his scanty board. But the smallest assistance cannot be rendered with impunity. And there he stands an applicant. He is told, "you must come into the house." "But it is my daughter." "Then she must enter the Union." And, if she does, there she must remain until her child dies, or her hair grows grey.--On the other side, and away from the rest, stands a coarse-featured man, who has often been an inmate of the county jail. He is the smuggler on the coast, the footpad on the common, the poacher in the forest, the housebreaker, the horse-stealer, the sheep-slayer, or the incendiary. He may be any of these. He demands his rights, and threatens vengeance if refused.--We turn from this group, and walk slowly to the Union-house, now visible in the distance; and, in walking, the time may be well employed in reflection. The thought which occurs with the greatest vividness is this--for the reception of such a group, what must the arrangements be? There is the old man, honest but poor, who seeks there an asylum. There is the man old in sin and iniquity, as well as years. There is the able-bodied man and woman with their family. There is the able-bodied man with his drunken, unthrifty wife, and his emaciated children. There is the young girl, whom the season has thrown out of her ordinary field employment. There is the woman with her illegitimate child, either heart-broken, or glorying in her shame. There is the girl, young in years but old in profligacy, suffering for her sins. There is the matron in her green old age, the result of a life of industry and prudence. And there is the ruffian, and the thief, and the profligate vagrant, male and female. Now what arrangements can be made for this assemblage--the bad anxious to obtain temporary quarters, the good anxious to retain their homes?

Surely they are not classed according to rules in which age, and sex, and state of health are the only principles? The widow with the prostitute, the aged cottar with the aged vagrant. If this were all, the moral consequences would not be so fearful. Does the young girl, who is now innocent, associate daily with her who has wandered over half the neighbouring counties, sinking lower and lower each journey? If so, poison will be instilled, which produces certain moral death. Refer to any list, now seven years old, of the inmates of a workhouse, who were then aged from twelve to eighteen years, and then inquire what has become of them. Or inquire of those who have the administration in metropolitan parishes, or in manufacturing and sea-port towns, how many of those unfortunates, scarcely yet arrived at the state of womanhood, and suffering from loathsome diseases, were brought up, or were sometime inmates of one of these Unions. Then there are the children of all these;--the children of the farm-labourer associating with those of the vagrant, who has quartered himself in the Union during the rains.

The evils which this system occasions are not, unfortunately, either to be seen or understood by the casual observer. Even our observer may suppose that all is well, after he has inspected the place. He sees every thing clean and in order. There are no rags, no unshorn beards, no unclean flesh. The ordinary concomitants of virtue are here present--by compulsion. The rags, the filthiness of place and person, are absent--by order. This is forgotten; and, allowing the outward and visible to govern his judgment rather than the inward and spiritual, he leaves the place exclaiming, "Well! this is not so bad after all!" The outside is indeed white, but it is the whiteness of the sepulchre.

If this group is to be received into one building, there must be something peculiar in its arrangements. All these persons are suffering, more or less, from the want of food, or lodging, or clothing, or medical aid. They are now offered the whole of these blessings, and yet they do not feel blessed thereby. He has now that livelihood freely offered to him which had cost him many a sigh to procure, and he has often sighed in vain. What then can or must be the nature of the arrangements? It must be remembered that this Union is presumed to be a test of poverty, and therefore the condition of its inmates must be inferior to that of the independent labourer.

To effect this, how must the authorities proceed? In the first place, there are arrangements which they cannot make. They cannot altogether dispense with the counsels of the medical man, while the matter is under discussion. And an inspector of prisons should be admitted, certainly, as far as the ante-room. Then the locality of the Union-house must not be unhealthy. The internal parts of the building must not be exposed to the inclemency of the seasons.

In the second place, the inmates of the Union must work. And here also there are limits which a Board cannot pass. Labour cannot be enforced from a diseased man. The prudent master of a Union will not require a task to be performed which he cannot enforce. The question is, what work can the inmates be set to do? Not to lace-making or stocking-weaving, for that is the staple of the neighbourhood. To give them this work would diminish the demand for labour out of doors. What labour then must it be? Here is the rock upon which the vessel is now driving. It must certainly be real work. Must it, then, be disagreeable work? It must. But there is no work so disagreeable that willing labourers cannot be found to do it, and that at a rate of wages reduced by competition. Then, again, the most disagreeable kind of labour cannot be done in a Union-house. And experience proves, that the number of such employments is extremely limited.

There are, however, certain kinds of labour that require no exertion of skill--no variety of operation--and consisting of the mechanical and monotonous operation of picking, which, if performed in the same room during a certain number of hours of each day, and from day to day, and from week to week, will become so sickening and wearying, that life with all its miseries, doubts, and anxieties, and impending starvation, will be welcomed in exchange.

This labour women may perform. Now, in what way can the men be tasked? There are certain kinds of mere labour, hard and monotonous, such as grinding--or rather turning a handle all day long--without seeing the progress or result of the toil. He might also be employed in breaking bones. This has been tried, and received a check.

What has been done? Surely the two bodies have not each issued the same regulations to paupers and prisoners. If this be so, the matter cannot rest. And that it must be so, is obvious from a mere inspection of the means which the workhouse master and the jailer have at their disposal. It is not an oversight or an abuse. The data being given, the consequences are inevitable. Each conclave has separately arrived at nearly the same conclusion. In one case a prison and a prisoner, and a brief period of incarceration is given, with the condition, that his punishment shall not be so severe as that of the criminal deeply dyed in crime; and yet his circumstances shall be less desirable than those of the independent labourer. In the other case, a pauper and a Union-house is given; and if the condition of the problem be, that the pauper's situation shall be less disagreeable than that of the independent labourer, the solution becomes impossible; and, if this latter condition be left out or forgotten, the result is, that the prisoner and the pauper are in the same position. This mode of treating the matter has been preferred to that of comparing dietaries and labour-tables, and to quoting from evidence showing the indifference with which the prison and the workhouse are regarded by the lower class of paupers. Our object has been to show that the strict workhouse system leads necessarily to these evils.

It is argued, on the other side, that pauperism has diminished in those Unions where the "prohibitory order" has been issued; and, in proof thereof, we are referred to reports and tables showing diminished expenditure. A family, with a judicious out-door management, would be able to subsist with the occasional assistance of two, three, or four shillings' worth of food weekly. The cost of the family in the house would be about 18s. weekly; and yet the expenditure in the rural Union, where the "prohibitory order" is in force, has been reduced. No especial reference can now be made to the amount of unrelieved suffering which this fact discloses. Those who decline the order cannot now be followed to their homes; nor can another incident of this system be dwelt upon--its tendency to reduce the standard of wages. The employer is likely to get labour cheap, when he has a number of unemployed labourers to choose from, who have just preferred to "live on" in a half-starved condition, rather than submit to a system of prison discipline. To return to the allegation, that pauperism has been diminished in those Unions where the order is in operation. The reply is--that the statistics do not touch the question. They ought to be thrown aside as useless, until the condition of those who have refused to enter the Union walls has been ascertained. Have their numbers become thinned by the ravages of the fever, which their "houseless heads and unfed sides" have unfitted them to resist? Have they been unable to pay their pittance of rent; and is the cottage, which was once theirs, now falling to decay? Have estates thus been thinned without the formality and notoriety of a warrant? Have the able-bodied left the Union, and become wanderers, seeking for an understocked labour-market; and, finding it not, are they becoming, through common lodging-house associations, half labourers, half vagrants--labouring to-day, begging to-morrow, and stealing the next? Is the inclination to wander growing into a passion? Are habits of strolling being formed? Is he gradually deteriorating to the half-savage state? Is this so? A great national question is involved. The French government know, by experience, the importance of a true knowledge of "Les Classes Dangereuses."

Now, if any of these applicants have become wanderers, or have migrated to distant towns where charities abound, or have been cut off by sickness, or have remained in a state of semi-starvation, the statistics would remain the same. Besides, these statistics embrace two periods; the present time, when an extremely rigid system of out-door relief is in action; and a past time, when the out-door management was loose, irregular, and rotten; and for the diminution of expenditure, arising from a sound system of out-door relief, no allowance has been made, the whole benefit of the economy being referred to the workhouse test.

It is probable much of the evil has been stayed, from the circumstance that the "system" has been carried into effect by human agency. A certificate of illness from the medical officer would exempt the individual from the operation of the rule. Now, the seeds of disease are oftentimes deeply hidden in the bodily frame; and the alleged throbbing or shooting pain, although the symptoms may not be seen, may have an existence, and be certified accordingly.

Then the relieving-officer, after relieving the case as one of sudden and urgent necessity to-day, may see the applicant again upon his next visit; and knowing that a case is urgent after forty-eight hours' fasting, and may be considered sudden, if two days' work only was obtained when four days was expected, he may be relieved on the same plea again, and again, and again. In point of fact, the relief is an allowance.

If this be the practice, a bad mode of out-door relief has grown into use, the worst peculiarities of the old method being involved in it. It is irregular, partial, and dependent on personal partialities and prejudices; and, if persisted in, would revive old times, when the overseer gave away, in the first place, to the bold, the insidious, and the designing, and modest merit was left to pick up the crumbs.

The result of an inquiry into the two other classes into which England is parochially divided would probably be, that many evils have been removed or lessened, that others have remained untouched, that much good has been secured, and that new abuses have crept in.

These abuses belong to the past, but their existence should not be forgotten. Pauperism would flourish. For a system of management, proverbially jealous of having its affairs exposed to the gaze of the ignorant vulgar, could not look with too curious an eye into the circumstances of those who applied for relief. The beadle who flourished in those days did not, as some affirm, derive his authority from his cocked hat or his gilded coat, but from the real power he exercised.

The overseers were elected with their will, or against it. They often served in a perpetual circle. The duty of relieving the poor was too often left to subordinate irresponsible officers, whose duties were neither expressed nor recognised. Their most arduous task was to keep their superior out of hot water. But what kind of cases were relieved, and under what circumstances, and what kind of cases were refused, and under what circumstances, is now mere matter--matter of tradition, and will become a mystery in the course of a few years. Many poor were relieved; but the bold, the idle, and the squalid had the best chance. Honest, humble poverty approached the overseer's door with fear and trembling, and the slightest rebuff or harsh word, which an importune application might occasion, would be sufficient to make her leave the door unrelieved. While the destitute confirmed pauper would annoy, insult, and extract relief, by the scandal of so much squalid destitution lying and crouching about the overseer's door.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet