traders in the country, to prosecute in cases of forgery, in consequence of the severity of the law. The dread of being instrumental in inflicting death had, with himself, and to his knowledge with others, operated as a protection to the criminal.

There are several points on which the Committee are desirous of offering some observation to the House; two of these are of great importance; the first relates to the best means of enabling judges to pronounce sentence of death only in those cases where they think it probable that death will be inflicted; the second, whether the establishment of unexpensive and accessible jurisdictions, for the trial of small offences, with the help of juries, but with simple forms of proceeding and corrective punishments, might be a means of checking the first steps towards criminality. These and other parts of this great subject, the Committee hope that the House will allow them to consider, by permitting them, in the next session, to resume, and, if possible, to complete their inquiries.

ABSTRACT

Of the Report of the Select Committee appointed to Inquire into the State of Mendicity in the Metropolis.

The body of evidence ascertains beyond all possibility of doubt, the gross and monstrous frauds practised by mendicants in the capital, and in its immediate neighbourhood; the success of which affords a direct encouragement to vice, idleness, and profligacy, as much more is gained by importu

nate solicitations in the street for charity, than is earned by the sober and most industrious artificers and labourers, by their utmost application to the work in which they are employed.

The profits of mendicity are so great as to afford a strong incitement to follow the practice.

Beggars on their being searched when brought before the magistrates, a great deal of money has been found about them, in their pockets, and in their clothes.

Beggars make great profits by various practices, such as changing their clothes two or three times a-day, and getting money intended for others.

Clear proof that a blind man and a dog got 30s. in one day.

Another man got 5s. a-day; he could with ease go through 60 streets a-day.

Another man 6s. a-day,

Two houses in the parish of St Giles frequented by from 200 to 300 beggars; receipts from 3s. to 5s. aday; they could not be supposed to spend less than 2s. 6d. at night, and pay 6d. for their bed.

A negro beggar retired to the West Indies with a fortune, it was supposed, of 1500l.

Beggars gain 3s. or 4s. a-day by begging shoes.

Considerable sums of money pulled out, and shared amongst beggars.

Gains of beggars, 6s., 7s., or 8s., and sometimes more.

The value of 15s., 20s., and 30s., found upon them; they get more by begging than they can by work; they get so much by begging, that they never apply for parochial relief.

Found upon beggars, 8s., 10s., and 12s., that they had gained in the course of the day.

The beggars state that they get more by begging than they can by work.

They get 4s. or 5s. a-day. 9s. and 10s. gained in a day, marked on a pass.

A woman alleged she could go through 60 streets in a day, and that was a bad street that did not yield 1d. Beggars get from 10s. to 20s. aday sometimes.

A beggar would spend 50s. a-week for his board.

Beggars have said they go through 40 streets in a day, and that it is a poor street that does not yield 2d.

A bad day that does not yield the beggars Ss. and more.

The evils attending mendicity are not, however, confined to adults; children of different ages are made use of to excite compassion; sometimes by themselves, and at other times are carried about by their parents, or persons pretending to be so. This use of children is not a novel one; in a statute of 1st Edward VI. c. 3, it is recited, that divers women and men go on begging, wayfaring, of which some be impotent and be lame, and some able enough to labour, which do carry children about with them, some four or five years of age, or younger or older, which, brought up in idleness, might be so rooted in it, that hardly they may be brought after to good thrift and labour. And a similar recital in the 3d and 4th Edward

VI. c. 16.

Beggars are furnished with children at houses in Whitechapel, Shoreditch; some who look like twins; children frequently on women's backs.

A woman had four children with her begging; much use made of chil

dren.

Children are annually instructed in idleness and drinking, and of course lying; idleness is sure to bring on ly ing and theft.

Children frequently sent out to beg, and not to return with less than 6d.

A girl of 12 years of age had been six years engaged in begging; on some days got 3s. or 4s. a-day; sometimes more, usually 18d. or 1s.; on Christmas-day, 4s. 6d.

One man will collect 3, 4, or 5 children from different parents, paying 6d. and 9d. for each, to go begging with. Parents beat their children if they do not carry home the sum required.

A woman in a constant state of intoxication with 3 children.

A woman with twins who never grew older; sat for ten years. Twins not the children of the beggars one time in a hundred.

A blind child hired to excite charity; 1s., 1s. 6d., or 2s. 6d., gained by each in a day.

Children let out by the day, who carried to their parents 2s. 6d. a-day, as the price paid by the persons who hired them; of course their gains must

have been more.

A little boy and a little girl earned 8s. a-day.

An instance is stated of an old woman who keeps a night-school for instructing children in the street-language.

Of the numbers of beggars in the streets in the metropolis, a probable conjecture only can be formed. Mr Martin, who has been extremely active in the department of inquiry about mendicity, stated them, thirteen years ago, at 15,000, of which 5300 were Irish; but the Committee will have occasion to refer, in a subsequent part of this Report, to a statement which will shew the probability of the num ber being considerably more. They are most numerous in the outskirts of the town; thirty or forty sleep in a large round bed.

In the neighbourhood of Whitechapel, thirty or forty houses, apparently crowded, in which are not less

than 2000 people, one half of whom live by prostitution and beggary; the remainder Irish labouring people.

It appears by the evidence of the person who contracts for carrying vagrants in and through the county of Middlesex, that he has passed as many as 12,000 or 13,000 in a year; but no estimate can be formed from that, as many of them are passed several times in the course of a year.

And it is proved that these people are, in the course of eight or ten days, in the same situation; as they find no difficulty in escaping as soon as they are out of the hands of the Middlesex contractor.

A magistrate in the office at Whitechapel thinks there is not one who is not worthless. It certainly appears uncontrovertible that an immense proportion of them are idle, profligate, and lazy, and living in great dissipation.

The rector of Saint Clement Danes describes them as living very well, especially if they are pretty well maimed, blind, or if they have children; he describes various practices of the beggars.

The beggars, after having perambulated their circuits, live well, spending a considerable portion of money; have hot suppers, and regale themselves with various liquors.

From 200 to 300 beggars frequent two public-houses in St Giles's, divided into companies, and subdivided into walks; live luxuriously at night. Beggars scarify their feet to make the blood come; they change their routes every day; share considerable sums of money, and get scandalously drunk; quarrel and fight; and one teaches the other the mode of extorting money; they are the worst of characters, blasphemous, and abusive; when they are detected as impostors in one parish, they go into another.

VOL. XIII. PART II.

They eat no broken victuals, but have ham, beef, &c.

Forty or fifty sleep in a house, and are locked in lest they should carry any thing away, and are let out in the morning all at once

The beggars, mostly of a desperately bad character, frequently sell clothes that are given to them.

Tear their clothes for an appearance of distress.

Beggars assemble in a morning, and agree what route each shall take.

At some of the houses the knives and forks chained to the tables, and other articles chained to the walls. The walks are sold.

In the summer they emigrate a good deal.

A variety of practices stated. Worthy persons, however distressed, will not have recourse to begging. Street beggars, with very few exceptions, utterly worthless and incorrigible.

Luxurious living.

Advantages of begging are such, that the parties would rather be imprisoned three months in the year than relinquish it.

Beggars evade the Vagrant Act by carrying matches and articles of little intrinsic value for sale.

Gainful practices of a man who is something of an attorney.

Various practices for obtaining money by beggars who are complete impostors.

Out of 400 beggars in St Giles's, 350 are capable of earning their own living.

In the course of this inquiry, it appeared that in almost all of the city parishes, and in some of those in the neighbourhood, the poor are farmed; to which there appear to be considerable objections; and, among others, adding to the numbers of beggars in the streets, as the persons who take

2 D

them to farm derive a profit from allowing them to go out to ask charity. One person at Hoxton farms the poor of 40 parishes, all within the city; the number of paupers about 300, many of whom beg.

In another house at Hoxton, the poor of 17 parishes are farmed; in some parishes there are no poor to be sent to farm.

At Mile End there is a house where the poor of nearly 40 parishes, mostly in the city, are farmed; some from neighbouring parishes; 350 paupers at Mile End, and 150 in another house at Old Ford.

The whole number may go out twice a-week, Wednesdays and Saturdays.

The persons farming them do not admit that the paupers beg to their knowledge; they have not, however, always distinguishing dresses. It is It is alleged the paupers have their meals on going-out days, and that they have religious instruction.

The poor of three parishes, six only in number, farmed in a house near the Minories; they are allowed to go out on Fridays and Saturdays, or Sundays; on other days not without leave.

A police magistrate states he had proof of hundreds of parish paupers begging on a Sunday.

A custom prevails in workhouses in general, to suffer the paupers to go out occasionally for holidays at certain times of the year.

A pauper, farmed out by a city parish, had a weekly allowance from the farmer of the poor at Hoxton, by whom he was permitted to go out to beg.

From the evidence of two members of the Committee, who visited the

houses at Hoxton and Mile End, it appears they were much crowded, and extremely filthy; nine, and ten, and eleven persons in a room; no space in the rooms when the beds were let down; no classification of the paupers; in one of them no infirmary. A practice of "flating" prevailed, which is an allowance of 24d. in lieu of a dinner. In one of the houses at Hoxton, the paupers had the means of going out when they chose to do 80. Twenty-two persons slept in a room 28 feet by 15; idiots were mixed with other paupers. Great complaint of the clothing being very defective, and of the insufficiency and quality of the food. On the whole, the situation of the paupers in the houses of these contractors appears to be very wretched.*

One class of paupers is so numerous as to render it desirable to make a special statement respecting them. We allude to the natives of Ireland, in which part of the united kingdom there are no laws for the support and maintenance of the poor. Some of these come to England (chiefly to London, or to places near it) in search of work, at a particular season of the year, and frequently do not return.

Much pains, by very particular inquiries, were taken in the year 1815, by a remarkably humane gentleman, to ascertain the number in London, only distinguishing the parishes; the result of which was, that 6876 adults, and 7288 children, were then found, making a total of 14,164.

In a court in Mary-le-bonne parish, containing only 24 very small houses, 700 of these poor people were found in a situation likely to occasion a considerable risk of contagion. These are,

however, not all mendicants; but it has been stated by the gentleman who gave that evidence, since his examination, that there were few of that number who had not themselves begged, or employed some in their families to do so. In the parish of St Giles, 32,000l. was raised for the poor; of which 20,000l. was applied to the lowest Irish.

The chief clerk to the magistrates at Guildhall states, that these people are passed to Bristol and Liverpool, where they take ship to go across.

And the clerk to the Lord Mayor supposes there are agents in those ports to convey paupers to Ireland, who are passed under the 17 Geo. II. c. 5.; but the Committee will have occasion to state, that on inquiry it has been found there is a misconception respecting that.

It is stated, that not one in ten who are passed to Ireland are shipped.

A few of the poorer sort are enabled to return to their country by the Irish Society, lately instituted; but the funds of that benevolent establishment are too limited to enable it to give much assistance to such as are desirous of going home.

The allowance for the passage of the paupers is so small, that they have been nearly famished when that has been a long one.

Probably 5000 more Irish poor in London in the latter end of June than there had been five weks before.

Some reform has been attempted among the lower Irish in the capital, by the establishment of a free school for their benefit in the parish of St Giles; but unhappily it has not succeeded to any considerable extent, notwithstanding the meritorious exertions of a very intelligent and humane master, who attributes the failure principally to the parents taking the children from the school for the more profitable occupation of begging.

Another class of beggars to which the Committee are desirous of drawing the attention of the House, are persons who receive pensions from the Royal Hospitals at Greenwich and Chelsea for naval and military services, as some of them are amongst the most importunate of those who infest the streets.

Some who have pensions as soldiers or sailors are among those who apply by letters for charity; one sailor, who had lost a leg, is one of the most violent and desperate characters in the metropolis.

Among beggars of the very worst sort there are about thirty Greenwich pensioners, who have instruments of music, and go about in parties.

The class of beggars who are Greenwich and Chelsea pensioners is pretty numerous; they are represented to carry on the trade of begging to a considerable extent.

A marine, who complained he had only 77. a-year pension, said, he could make a day's work in an hour in any square in London.

Some are guilty of acts of violence when in the custody of the contractor for removing beggars.

A pensioner who had 187. a-year from Chelsea, when taken up begging, had bank notes in a tin box concealed in his waistcoat; and on many of that description frequently 8s., 10s., or 12s., are found, that they have got in a day.

A pensioner of 7. a-year, committed for begging; sailors frequently go four or five together.

Chelsea pensioners beg in all directions, at periods between the receipts of their pension. When the parish officers know that persons who receive relief from them are entitled to pensions, they deduct half the amount of the pensions on sending in a list to the office.

A Chelsea pensioner, who receives