" The Committee have been informed, that, within these few weeks, as is customary at this season of the year, there have entered London about 5000 persons of the labouring class, probably many of the mendicant class ?I cannot speak to the number ; but I have no doubt of it.
" Would your plan of an Asylum go to the reliev ing those persons ?.It would go to the relieving all persons who are mendicants, or had lost their cha racter, by being committed for petty offences to the different prisons of the metropolis." This, undoubtedly, is the right idea. Provide a sys tem of Reformatories as perfect as they might easily be made, and you may accomplish every thing. De prive yourselves of this important instrument, and you can do but little to any good purpose. A more ap propriate place for describing thismeasure in detail, will occur more than once hereafter. We know, however, only one good plan, and that is before the world already, in Mr Bentham's Panoptican- Ap ply this, with the system of management which be has contrived for it, and if you do not extinguish the evil of pauperism, in all its degrees, you will un doubtedly reduce it to its lowest terms.
In the testimony given by the chaplain of Bride well, as we have seen tn theTreading quotation, he mentions, "the investigation of each particular case of beggary," as an advantage of the highest possible kind.
Mr Butterworth said," I conceive that no plan of relieving the poor is so effectual as "thatof visiting them at their own habitations ; and even then, in quiry must be made of their neighbours, to know their real characters, as.persons in the habit of beg ging are adepts in the art of in3position." Mr Cooper was asked," In what way do you think poor families may be mostly benefited by the exercise of benevolence ?I know of no way more efficient than that of their being visited and relieved at their own habitations ; and, in fact, as far as my observation and experience go, there is no certainty whatever of any donation being properly applied, without investigating the circumstances at their own habitations." We deem these testimonies of great import ance ; as we are convinced, that what is here recommended, a distinct investigation of each in dividual clue, rendered co-extensive with the po pulation, would be attended with innumerable advan tages.
To render this investigation practicable, without enormous trouble, and, indeed, to render it possible with any tolerable degree of exactness, another and \ a most important operation is required, subservient to an infinite number of good purposes ; and that is, a proper system of registration. The whole country should be divided into sections, containing each a moderate number of inhabitants ; the names, residen ces, and descriptions of the inhabitants of each sec tion should be entered in a public record ; and means employed (as much as could be without incurring any serious inconvenience of a different sort) for placing the people of each under the full inspection of one another. How important a check this would
be on improper conduct of every sort is intuitively manifest. How easy, too, it would render the busi ness of visitation, and what perfect knowledge it would afford of the circumstances of each individual case, it is impossible to overlook.
The importance of registration was. not unknown to some of the witnesses before the Mendicity Com mittee. Sir N. Conant observed," In a town like this, where no creature knows the inhabitant of the next house hardly, or their character, and especially among the poor, the overseers of parishes ready enough at all times to spare if they can, by any kind of indulgence (I was going to say) the parish purse, are always willing to put at a distance every person who applies, being entirely ignorant either of their character or of their necessity. Until they are forced to take them in, and give them relief, they seldom do, unless they know them, and they know very few Of the inhabitants even of their own parish, in the very nature of the thing ; this applies to any condition of life, and more especially to the poor ; that introduces another class of mendicants, which are people deserving of parochial relief, in the inter val before theyget-it. If the paupers apply to-day to the parish officer, being settled in their parish, they are not known to him ; and the parish officer either says, he shall make some inquiry; or, that they look strong and hearty, and able to maintain themselves, or that their families may be imposed upon them, and that he shall inquire and see, and they work." We find Benefit Clubs, and Savings Banks, held forth as means for the preventing of beggary.. But we question, whether the sort of people who apply to savings banks and benefit clubs are apt to become beggars. We see, that those among the common people, who have had any moral feelings implanted in them, will in general die rather than beg. We see also, that the having a provision already made is no security against mendicity, when the mind is worthless ; because many of the Greenwich Chelsea pensioners beg, and are among the most troublesome of all beggars. It would surely not be difficult to find a better mode of paying these pen goners, so as to afford a check upon their vices. Some way might also be found of punishing those parishes, who, when a beggar is passed to them, in stantly let him out again, to prey upon the public. When a beggar appears, if it is resolved to suppress them altogether ; or when he acts in any such man ner as to create a nuisance, if it is only proposed to suppress what is noisome about them ; it should al, ways be easy at the moment for any passenger, or observer, to put in execution the means of taking them up. For this purpose, it would be necessary that a constable or beadle authorized for this pur pose should be in every street, and his residence rendered conspicuous to all the passengers.