northern counties, they were refused. This was denounced as tyrannical; and the wrongs of the sect whom it affected were set forth from every Free-Kirk pulpit. In, however, discussing their spiritual, their temporal wrongs oozed out. It came to be explained that a very good reason for denying permission to erect more churches in Sutherlandshire existed in a system of political economy that has been carried out in that county for some years past; the object of which is to drive the poor away, to make room for sheep a kind of flock to which churches are of no manner of use. The system has been in full operation for some years, and would not in all probability have been fully imparted to the Public mind, if the Caledonians had kept as unanimous as usual. But the Free-Kirk people made the most of it, and took up one wholesale case with great effect. It was ascertained that on the 12th of last May, no fewer than ninety-one persons were to be removed from their homes in Ross-shire and Sutherlandshire. Public appeals were set on foot, some of them in the form of advertisements inserted in the Free-Kirk and other newspapers, and one was sent to the office of the "Times" in London. It appears that the case of heartlessness and oppression it set forth was too strong for belief, and the wary conductors of that journal refused to insert the appeal till they had instituted special inquiry into its truth. They forthwith despatched the gentleman by whose activity, discrimination, and literary talent so much good was previously effected for Wales. What he saw, and what he communicated, fully bore out the contents of the advertisements, and what seven government commissioners and their three enormous blue books (in which the whole story of the "clearances " is buried), were unable to do, this one intelligent gentleman, backed by the powerful journal he belongs to, promptly effected ;-the Public Mind was roused. To be sure there was everything in his favour to excite the sentimentality of the mens publica. The Highlands are not too near, and are, moreover, extremely picturesque; then the ninetyone poor creatures who were, as threatened, ruthlessly thrust from their homes on the 12th of May, were obliged to huddle all together in a tent pitched in the churchyard (that of Kincardine), where the bones of their fathers reposed; for none of the tenants who were allowed to remain, dared to shelter them under their roofs, for fear of being thrust from their homes also. All this was pretty and romantic, and the picture simply drawn excited the public mind to a high point of indignation against a system-a national system

which could bring about such unmeasured oppression.

We are

now going to give some idea of it, and then to show that the permanent destitution, starvation, and death which the Scotch poorsystem creates in large towns, is greater than that it brings about in the Highlands :

First of the system. The poor in Scotland are treated not with regard to their necessities, but as a problem in economics, the terms of which are :-Given, so many poor; how can they be dealt with at the very least possible expense to the rich?

This is the way in which the problem is solved :—it is held as an axiom, that to provide for the poor is to demoralise them; to afford sustenance to keep them alive will of necessity ruin their characters. "Legal assessments," it is argued, "tend to generate in the lower classes a spirit of servile dependence, and give encouragement to idleness and vice. Remove the sense of shame attached to the reception of charitable donations, and convert it into something like a feeling of right, and one of the strongest barriers to the increase of pauperism is taken away. As long as the poor have such a fund in prospect, their present wants employ their whole attention, and they seldom think of making provision for sickness and old age." In accordance with this assumption, the destitute in Scotland have not, as with us, any right to relief. Everything that is done for them is-they are assiduously made to understand voluntary, and given as a charity; so that, whenever an individual gets so low in the world as to become a pauper, he is by that misfortune converted literally into a beggar. He either begs for relief at the Kirk sessions of a rural district, of the municipal authorities of a town, or is licensed by them to beg from door to door.

The second axiom is, that if you force the rich, by assessments, to contribute to the wants of the poor, you leave no room for the exercise of that large philanthropy and lavish liberality for which the Scottish nation is so widely celebrated! Let us see to what extent this national liberality goes: the only public fund to which the poor can, by Scotch law, look for relief, is that derived from charitable bequests, voluntary gifts of heritors (proprietors), and collections made on Sundays at the church-doors. Now, these

*The local papers inform us, that in the county of Ross-shire alone, the number of tenants who have received notice to "clear out" this year, is 403. † Analysis of the Statistical Account of Scotland, Part II. p. 160.

sources are so utterly inadequate to the demands upon them, even as judged of by the stingy theories of the Scotch philosophers, that assessments are obliged to be resorted to, especially in large towns. Even out of the charitable contributions thus-if we may use so hyperbolical a word-amassed, the Kirk sessions often abstracts sufficient to defray expenses connected with the church, such as repairs.*

But what is the result of that lavish liberality of rich to poor, which compulsory assessment would, it is feared by the Caledonian philosophers, destroy? The statistics of one parish shall answer the question; and we select it because it is, so far as we can ascertain, inhabited by the most opulent people in the whole country;—we mean that of St. Cuthbert's, Edinburgh. In 1842 this parish contained about 71,000 inhabitants, out of whom 14,961 were sufficiently well off to pay rates and taxes. Before we startle the reader with the amount of their church-door donations, it is necessary to premise that one excellent trait in the Scottish character is constant attendance at church. The sumtotal of charity there contributed would obviously be materially affected by habits of Sabbath-breaking, a vice which is so much detested that whoever habitually indulges in it is held in deep disgrace. Well, with all their church-going habits and liberal gifts, the inhabitants of this parish contributed, in the year ending July 15, 1844, at three church doors, the munificent sum of 1177. 178. 4d.! † And lest this might be thought an extreme case an unusually low amount for the St. Cuthbert flockwe add the total they put into the same church plates in 1842; it was 1717. 12s. 33d.‡ To be sure, efforts have been made on extraordinary occasions to increase these voluntary contributions. In the Cholera year (1832) the town council was petitioned to authorise a general collection in the churches and chapels of the next parish or "royalty." Death, be it remembered, was mowing down his daily hundreds in the Cowgate, Canongate, and other pestiferous parts of the city; in many cases because his victims were without natural sustenance. The kirk-sessions could only authorise such a collection, and to it the petition was formally

Evidence of Dr. Lee before the Commissioners, p. 852 of Appendix, Part III.

Eleventh Report of the Managers of the Poor of St. Cuthbert's, or West Kirk parish, Edinburgh, page 16.

Ninth Report of the same, page 17.

NO. VII.-VOL. II.

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remitted. The memorial was returned by its chief, the Christian minister of the parish, refusing to authorise any such collection ! *

So much for the efficiency and amount of church subscriptions. To this it will be answered, perhaps, that in these instances the church collections are made and expected from a community already assessed. Granted. But are the beggarly amounts we have quoted greater in proportion to affluence and population, in unassessed parishes? We have very good reason to state that they are not.

We must now address a word or two to the Public mind on the point of assessment; reverting to St. Cuthbert's, because it is one of the richest parishes in Scotland. In raising assessments, says the late Sir William Drysdale, "the great object was economy. The council wished to keep the people from paying more; they wished to keep down the rate of assessment." +

ma

That is their sole end, aim, and object. The evidence of their own officers proves incontrovertibly, that the wants of the poor form not merely the last point of consideration, but that they are never considered at all. In adducing one out of a thousand instances of this, it is necessary to explain that though the towncouncil are ex-officio 66 managers of the poor (the very term is characteristic; the poor, God help them! are indeed naged" in Scotland), they have no "guardians." The council are obliged, however, to delegate this part of their duties to another body. In the cholera year, then, the actual managers of the poor in one district thinking it would be a wise preventive to feed their poor a little better than usual, exhausted their legitimate funds, ran into debt, and applied to the towr-council to make their debt and disbursements good. The council—in their dread of taxing themselves and their wealthy fellow-citizens one penny extra to pay for the salvation of the lives of their poor neighbours-refused the requisite assessment. Hence the managers incurred a debt of 16,000l., "of which neither principal nor interest has been paid." +

In possession of these facts, the Public mind will be somewhat prepared to understand that paupers are starved in Scottish towns on the most economical principles. But we question whether its direst expectations will equal the facts; those especially which belong to the affluent parish before alluded to.

Sir W. Drysdale's Evidence before Poor-law Commission, Part I. No. 3618. Out-of-church subscriptions were, however, collected in creditable

sums.

+ No. 3620.

Mr. R. Miller, Part I. of Evidence, No. 765.

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Out of the cash extracted from the parishioners of St. Cuthbert's by church collections and assessment, in the year ending 15th July, 1844, the sum of 2,9971. 6s. 8d. was distributed upon 1,559 out-door paupers, for their sole sustentation. The average income, therefore, of each pauper was not quite 17. 18s. 6d. per annum, or a fraction less than 9d. per week! For mercy's sake!" claims the reader, what becomes of the poor creatures? Does not private benevolence step in to rescue them from the grave?" Sometimes it does; but (and the fact would be perfectly incredible were it not recorded in evidence) when that is the case, and it is known to the parish officers, the pittance is reduced in proportion to the amount of succour thus received. "In fixing the allowances," say the Scotch commissioners, whilst advocating, rather than reporting on, their pet system, "the circumstances of individuals are separately considered, their claims on relations, the assistance they receive from private charity, and every other possible source of income. The truth of this statement one instance will fully corroborate :-A few winters since a soup-kitchen was established in Edinburgh by several benevolent inhabitants; and it is a fact that every pauper receiving out-door relief, who partook of the sustenance thus provided, was mulcted of his or her pension, in an amount equal to the value of the basins of soup partaken of during the month!! This was a refinement of meanness which no invective can exaggerate, which no imaginative satirist could invent.

"Can such things be

And overcome us like a summer-cloud?"

By no means that ninepence per week suffices to keep the life and soul of a mere pauper together is the reverse of an evanescent theory; it is, in Scotland, philosophised and insisted on. Some say this magnificent income is quite enough; whilst other enthusiastic economists actually pronounce it to be-TOO MUCH! One witness and he a doctor-speaketh in this wise :-"That with regard to a father and mother with four children under ten, at the working period of life, three shillings and sixpence or three shillings per week, might make them comfortable." That is, sixpence a week each person. He goes on to say, he knows a man who spends sixpence per week only "for nourishment; very coarse indeed, but yet sufficient."+ Without wishing to be rude, we flatly tell the learned doctor, we don't believe him.

* Report, page xi.

+ Evidence, Part I., No. 2376.