HOSPITALS for indigent old men and women are found in several European countries, but nowhere are they so common as in Great Britain and the Netherlands, where begging is rigorously proscribed by the police, and almsgiving assumes the character of rates for support of the poor. The workhouses for the reception of . parish paupers are the humblest variety of these hospitia, though as seen in some parts of England and Scot-, land they are on a vast scale of accommodation, adapted to the wants of unions or clusters of parishes. Considerably above these in point of comfort and liberality of management are the hospitals endowed by individuals or by incorporations for persons who once occupied a respectable position and have through misfortunes lapsed into decayed circumstances. Almost every city of any note in the United Kingdom has one or more of this species of hospital; the claim for admission being ordinarily a privi lege of local burgesses or members of incorporated crafts. Analogous to this class of institutions was Greenwich hospital, for superannuated mariners connected with the royal navy, and the military hospital, Chelsea. In England there are numerous estab
lishments called almshouses. These are of the nature of hospitals for indigent men and women of respectable character, hut with this difference, that instead of allliving in wards ander one roof, the inmates are each provided with a small dwelling for him or herself, and receive the means of separate livelihood. These establishments, consisting of clusters of neat small cottages in contiguity, or of separate dwellings grouped in the form of a spacious building, abound in London and its vicinity, where they afford pleasing examples of the .munificence opulent benefactors and incorporated city companies. At St. Cross, near Winchester, and at Coventry there are almshouses curious from their antiquity and external appearance. The noblest example of this class of institutions is the Charter-house, London, described in the present work.