far as they fall short of affording sustenance to the labourer and his family, he must make up the deficiency by lawless means, or be supplied from the poor's rate: the latter is an expedient which too many farmers, in country parishes, have adopted, although they are almost, exclusively the employers of the poor, and payers of the rates, and therefore can profit little by this sinister management. In the return from the parish of Cornwell, Oxford, the ove scers account for the comparatively low rate. in the pound of their assessment to the poor, by saying, "We give our labourers good wages, who are thereby enabled to support their families comfortably, and seldom apply for relief, but in particular cases. Vide Abstract, p. 400.-Were it possible to apportion the product of the land betwixt the owner, cultivator, and labourer, according to their respective claims fairly estimated, it would be well; but at present the cultivator has to contend, unless he has the benefit of an old lease, with excessive rents, heavy taxes, and advanced charges for all his husbandry implements, whereby his condition is sometimes little to be envied by his common labourers. Landlords must abate of their rents, before an increase of the wages of labour can be sustained by their tenants; as it is, should corn and cattle decline in price, as, in the event of a peace, may be expected, we must not be surprised to hear of very general distress among the tenantry of the country. But though the high price of provisions and inadequate wages of country labour, tend greatly to swell the amount of the poor's rate, yet there are o.her causes which concur in no small degree to the saine end; such a cause we may trace in the very general extinction of that ingenuous shame among the poor, which formerly withheld them from applying for parish relief. The poor would then struggle hard to rescue themselves and their families from such humiliating dependence; and as the incans of benevolence were not, then, wrested, by complicated and oppressive taxation, added to excess of current expences, from the middling people, their struggles were facilitated and generally successful. It is now widely different. The poor, on the first, and on every slight occasion, claim with confidence, and as a right, the allowance which heretofore they avoided, or received with diffidence and pain. Instead of making exertions in proportion to their difficulties, they now

look at once to the poor's fund as their only refuge against hunger and nakedness: application for parish relief has ceased to be deemed reproachful, and the residence in a poor-house to be feit as a disgrace, either by the residents, or their families; but, these sensations must, I am persuaded, be revived before any material decrease of our paupers, or dimi nution of our poor-rates, can be obtained.

When we observe the manners and ha bits in which the poor commonly bring up their children, we cannot wonder at the increase of paupers; and this is occasioned by a general relaxation of discipline towards all descriptions of them, from the lazy and thriftless parishioner to the roving sturdy vagrant. The effects of this relaxation are seen in our streets hourly, where we cannot but notice boys, fit for some kind of work, loitering, beg ging, or playing together, and swearing at almost every word, with a strong probability, seeing the ragged state of them, that their fathers are wasting their time in alehouses, at least wasting part of every day there, whilst their wives and other children are at home neglected, almost naked, and nearly starved, relying on parish relief for that succour, which the industry of the husband and parent, if exerted, and the whole family co-operating, would fully supply. But if, impressed with a strong sense of this misconduct, an indig uant observer should demand of the overseer, why he suffers it to prevail in violation of the Act, 32 Geo. III. c. 45, wherein it is enacted, that "If any person shall not use proper means to get employment, or is able to work and neglects it, or spends his money in alehouses, and shall not apply a proper portion of the money, earned by him, towards the maintenance of his wife and family, so that they become chargeable, he shall be punished as a disorderly person"—that is, be committed to the house of correc tion to be kept to hard labour; and why, if such person pretends that he cannot get employment, he does not provide the means of setting him, and such idle children, to work, according to the statute of the 43d of Eliz. he will tell you that, by a long relaxation of discipline, the poor have, in a manner, obtained an immunity against the law, and were he to attempt a reform in his parish, it would be like running his head into a hornet's nest; and even if he were resolute to fulfil this part of his duty, it would be impossible for him to provide stocks of requisite materials, and proper superintend

auce

ance of the works, without putting the parish to much greater expence, than is incurred by his apparent remissness in his office. Neither is the overseer checked by these considerations alone; for, by late acts of Parliament, a power is given to justices of the peace of interfering with, and contouling his authority in points of discipline, which our earher laws enjoined him, under penalties, to enfore; such for instance, as that which empowers magistrates to excuse paupers from wearing the parish badge, as directed by the Act 8,9, Will. III. c. 30, s. 2, whereby that mark of degradation has fallen nearly into disuse, and disorderly paupers go undistinguished, as such, in every parish. And again, by the Act, Geo. I. c. 7, s. 4. poor persons who require parish relief, and yet refuse to be maintained in the workhouse provided for them, under that Act, are to be put out of the collection book, and not be intitled to relief; but by a subsequent law, 36 G. III. c. 23, justices may order relief to be given to poor persons at their own houses, whereby the intent of providing such workhouses is often frustrated, and the pretences of the pauper set successfully up against the authority of the overseer, to the certain extension of relaxed discipline. The power given to justices in these cases is, it is true, limited by circumstances; but it very rarely happens, that an overseer feels disposed to contest a doubtful point with the magistrate, when sure, by so doing, if successful, to incur the ill word and ill will of the poor around him; and it is truly remarked in a note to the return of the parish of Bushey (county of Herts), by the Rev. Mr. Vivian, rector of that parish-" It is impossible not to observe, that the want of all shame, in applying for parochial charity, must be attributed, among other causes, to the inconsiderate interference of authority, in throwing families on the poor's rate, who otherwise would have been above depending on the parish." The facility of thus getting relief, after their own way, represses the necessity of their vigilance to seek out employment, and all inducement to economise their earnings among the poor, and thus parish relief, without labour, becomes the fruitful parent of debauchery and depravity. There is one writer of consideration, who, in hais Essay on Population, refers the increased misery of the poor, of late years, Lo our overabundant people, whereby Jabour is reduced in value, whilst food is

less in proportion to people, and of course dearer. That our poor have multiplied with our people is true, but it must be admitted also, that the means of employing them in useful and diversified occupations, have increased in an equal or greater proportion: our trades manual and mercantile, and arts liberal and mechanic, are prodigiously extended of late years, and have supplied employment for numerous additional bands; and yet these resources have not kept back the progress of poverty and increase of the poor's rate. War, without doubt, occasions great waste of provisions, and, but for this waste, I am inclined to think, that our national supply of good and wholesome food would scarcely fall short of our demands, except in very unproductive years; nor, perhaps, even then were the laws revised and enforced, which interdict the conversion of lands from tillage to pasture, and the accumulation of farms. We may perceive what were the sentiments of our ancestors on these evils, nearly three centuries ago, by referring to the statute 25 Hen. VIII. c. 13, the preamble of which states, "That by reason of the accumulation of farms and cattle, especially sheep, into few hands, and putting such lands to pasture and not to tillage, towns have been destroyed, rents raised, and all manner of corn, cattle, wool, pigs, geese, hens, chickens, eggs, are enhanced almost double their accustomed price, by reason whereof a marvellous multitude and number of people be not able to provide meat, drink, and cloaths for themselves, their wives, and children, but be so discouraged by misery and poverty, that they fall daily to theft, robbery, and other inconveniences, or pitifully die for hunger or cold; and, as it is thought by the King's most humble and loving subjects, that one of the greatest occasions that moveth and provoketh those greedy and covetous people so to accumulate, and keep in their hands, such great portions and parts of the grounds and lands of this realm, from the occupying of the poor husbandmen, and so to use it in pasture and not in tillage, is only the great profit that cometh of sheep," &c. It then limits the number of sheep to be kept by any person, and forbids any one to "take in farm any more houses and tenements of husbandry, whereunto any lands are belonging above the number of two such holds, or tenements; nor two such, except he or they be dwelling in the same parish, under the penalty of 3s. 4d. per

week,

week, during his occupation of such holds." I believe such an Act as this, making the penalty 101. per week, would tend to relieve the poor's rate, and reduce the price of provisions, with more certainty than can ever be expected from the well-meant endeavours of all our prime breeders and speculative agricultu

rists.

..

Relief of the Poor.-That the poor-laws, in respect of relief, had their commencement in wisdom and humanity, is certain; the helpless young and old, "unprovided for and unprotected, have a natural claim on the community, of which they are members, for succour in their necessities; a claim to be fulfilled, and not trusted to the chance of private benevolence. But though the extremes of age, as well as casual infirinity, be fair claimants of help in their distress, it becomes a question of some moment, how much further parochial relief should be allowed: it certainly should not be extended so far as to damp the actual exertion of the poor, by holding out indiscriminately to all the able and unable, willing and unwilling, a sure provision under all circumstances of apparent want; for if so, the able will be less solicitous to procure work, and the unwilling will, it possible, decline it when offered; both induced, by this very pro. vision for their support in cases of real need, to prefer indolence to labour, a subsistence on the dole of public charity, or rather of public contribution, given with reluctance, and often with rebuke, to that obtained by the well earned wages of their own active efforts. "The parochial fund should be rendered a stimulus to industry, not a boon for the encouragement of idleness." But it is most certain, that a compulsory allowance of relief to the able poor, in all instances of temporary privation of work, acts as a discouragement to their laying up something in store against a time of extremity, as a premium to idleness with all its evil consequences. Hence it has been said, that the very law that provides for the poor increases their number.

The able pauper out of work, who gets an allowance of money, for the support of himself and family, from his parish of ficers, and which, if they cannot employ him, they dare not refuse, is almost compelled to a misemployment of his time, and of course of becoming an example to his neighbourhood of idleness and mischief. His allowance must needs be in the lowest proportion to his wants,

and to improve it he has recourse to illegal practices, into which his whole family is initiated, going on progressively from beating hedges and fences for fuel, and pilfering loose articles, to stealing poultry and corn; poaching and smuggling; and if, by these aids, a little excess of money be gotten, it is commonly spent at the alehouse, where congenial company and tippling soon confirm his disgust of regular labour. A few instances of this sort occuring in our parishes, and, I am sure, a great many such cases are continually occurring in most country parishes of any extent, must divert great numbers of the poor, yearly, out of the regular pursuit of industry, into those of trespass and outrage on the community. If we look back to the statute 43 Elz. we shall find no provision made for pecuniary relief, but to such of the poor as are lame, impotent, blind, and unable to work; for all others who cannot maintain themselves and families, it commands the overseer to find employment, and thereby enable them to earn their living. The legislature by this statute meant to discourage all idleness among the able poor, both children and adults, and that the unable should be relieved according to their necessities, and provided, as far as human foresight could do, against any failure, in the execution of the provisions of the act, by 1st, subjecting the churchwardens and overseers of parishes to a penalty, for neglecting this duty of setting the poor to work ;-2dly, by enabling justices of the peace to tax other parishes of the hundred; or, if those of the hundred were unable, of the county, in aid of any parish whose inhabitants could not levy sufficient sums among themselves; and 3dly, by authorising a commitment to the house of correction, or common goal, of such poor as would not employ themselves to work being appointed thereto. All the means, there fore, which power and money could give were placed by this act in proper hands, for carrying a general plan of industry among the necessitous poor into effect. It might seem wonderful with such a straight line of duty before parish officers, that this important part of the statute should have become almost a dead letter; and yet, owing to the causes before stated, as every overseer can confirm, the requisite employment, notwithstandthe ample power given by this act, cannot with certainty be found, and advantageously exercised in single parishes; and, in consequence of it, the abuse of

granting

as can exert no industry, who not only Occupy space, and render the air less 'pure, but engage the time and attention of many who would be otherwise advantageously employed. In truth, those workhouses, with inmates of all ages, and all unemployed, can be deemed little better than seminaries of sloth, filth, and mischief: in such places vice must be prevalent; the old of both sexes have leisure, and too often inclination, to corrupt the young; and the latter, unused to work, will never readily take to it after a certain time; they will prefer sloth and casual subsistence by craft, through life, to regular subsistence by labour. Neither does any plan of einployment, if it could be carried on with some profit, in our ordinary parish houses, seem likely to save the younger residents from the contagion of ill example, since it would divide these sinall Communities into too many parts, were those of different ages and sexes completely separated. The regulation, how ever is indispensable to the well-doing and well-being of associated paupers, and has been so ordained in all our best-conducted houses of united parishes; but if, with the disadvantages enumerated, we take into account the annual expendi ture on these workhouse poor, which, according to the abstract in the year 1802--3, amounted to the sum of 1,016,445. or at the average rate of 12. 3s. 6d. per head, what shall we say to the present system of management, as far as it applies to the houses so wretchedly conducted? It were certainly better to allow the inmates the same amount of money, as out-poor, than expend it so improvidently on them in places miscalled workhouses.

Of the Out-Poor--The number of outpoor, or those maintained out of workhouses, is, according to the abstract, classed as follows:

Those on permanent relief
336,199

Adults,

only about 144,829 of the adults (allowing 20,000 such among the in-poor), and the children under five years of age, were disabled from labour, leaving 386,248 adults and children, of which two-thirds, or perhaps three-fourths, may be deem ed able to get their living, if properly employed, and the remainder to earn something in aid of it, on permanent relief. Why they were intitled to this, is difficult to be comprehended. It could not be for want of work; for that, like casual sickness, and accidents, is the plea of the occasional poor for temporary relief. In short, it serves to demonstrate, that an institution is indispensable, whereby all pretences for relief may be brought to the test of truth, and the public cease to be imposed on by the cunning and auda city of paupers, or by the weakness or partiality of overseers; such an institution as would enable every parish-officer in the kingdom to say to its able paupers, clamourous for relief for themselves or their able children, There is work for you, the relief which you require must be ob tained by labour, wholly or in part; but for relief in money, you are not intitled to it by law, nor am I by law authorized to grant it you must work, or starve.

For the Monthly Magazine. On the NATURAL and ARTIFICIAL CHARACTER of the TEA-TREE.

RESPECT botany; I love it: and

I according to my leisure I study it.

At the same time that leisure is little and interrupted. And I am not a botanist, but a botanophilist, a lover of botany and of plants. It may be said, why then propose to remove a plant into another genus? Had I been a botanist, I might have made the removal at my peril, it is true, if not justified by the principles of the art: as a lover of botany, I merely proposed it to those qualified to judge.

I shall not much urge that the distinction to which your correspondent adverts, is not always very clear, conspicuous, and certain nor that I do not think that it is very obviously apparent in the teatree; though I might say both.

I shall not urge that the 12th and 13th classes, which depend on this distinction, the icosandra and the polyandra, are of such near kindred, that botanists of no mean estimation were, I believe, not long since inclined to throw down the barrier, and unite them into one class. But I shall say this, that I am

glad