ALTRUISM ECONOMICALLY CONSIDERED. 63 



law thaii she ever was by a hostile army." Meanwhile we should 

 be self-respecting enough to admit that tramps and beggars are 

 not very different from many " respectable " people, after all. 



Those who are interested to examine the economic results of 

 giving to the poor, in England, Scotland, and Ireland, will find 

 plenty of books on the subject. The " Encyclopsedia Britannica " 

 contains a good article under the heading " poor-law." See also 

 other encyclopaedias. 



The Scotch are proverbially thrifty and economical, and yet 

 they have been degraded by the poor-law of 1845. In some parts 

 of Scotland there is ten times the poverty there is in Ireland! 

 That law gives more relief than England's, and the money is re- 

 garded as a nice gift. Those who had savings in banks trans- 

 ferred them to others. Careful investigation, and even the labor 

 test, did not quell the applications in any such manner as did the 

 Irish workhouse. Matters came to such a pass that the fishermen 

 of Wick could not get their nets mended, their former assistants 

 saying that they could get a living easier from the parish. 



In Ireland there is very little out-door relief, the proportion of 

 Scotland being almost reversed — five in-door to one out-door pau- 

 per. In spite of Ireland's unjust land system and high rents, the 

 whole number of her paupers does not amount to one half those 

 of London alone. The Irish will submit to every privation rather 

 than let friends go to the workhouse, which is the legal mode of 

 relief, and is not a charity. 



In London many people get relief who could do without it, and 

 consider it no disgrace. Industry, economy, temperance, and self- 

 restraint would enable most of them to take care of themselves if 

 they would. Hence the workhouse is a necessary restraint, being 

 uncomfortable or even disgraceful. They therefore shun it. If 

 they may eat without work in some other way, they will ; if not, 

 many of them will work. Why are these people in such condi- 

 tion ? It is a duty we owe to society to ascertain what are their 

 thoughts, what the motives that have led them to such lives. If 

 the result is that the vices and injustices and prodigality of the 

 rich have in part induced such results, let it be exposed boldly and 

 fearlessly. If injustice in the wage system and in land tenure is 

 the cause in part, let this also be proclaimed. 



You will, however, be more interested in some figures from our 

 own experience. The Hon. Seth Low, ex-Mayor of Brooklyn N.Y., 

 presented a paper in 1881 at the eighth National Conference of 

 Charities and Corrections in Boston which Robert Treat Paine 

 calls the corner-stone of relief reform. In it Mr. Low sums up his 

 opinion of the world's experience in giving alms (technically 

 called out-door relief). Of the supposed beneficiaries he says : 



1. That it saps their habits of industry. 



