MISCELLANIES. 
for relief is at all deserving of the 
‘fostering hand of benevolence; 
generally speaking, they are 
worthless characters, too indolent 
and too depraved to work. A 
great many of them have work in 
hand, and they frequently leave 
it for the purposes of begging, 
and neglect their work in pro- 
portion as they are successful in 
preying upon the feelings of a 
generous public. I have known 
instances of my own work people, 
who have left good looms of 
work to go out begging. Some 
time back in Old Broad-street, 
leading to the Royal Exchange, 
where there are a number of mer- 
chants living, who walk about 
four o'clock towards the Ex- 
change; coming towards Spital- 
fields I met a2 woman as I was 
crossing the street in a hurry ; 
she had an infant in her arms, 
and asked charity; I looked her 
in the face, and she was very 
much confused ; she and her hus- 
band worked for me at the time ; 
he had a good loom’s work, and 
she silk-winding, which I was at 
the time very much in want of. 
I took an opportunity to reason 
with her on the impropriety of 
her conduct, leaving work and 
employing her time in that man- 
ner; and her excuse was, that 
owing to some circumstances, 
they had not been able to make 
up the money for their rent ; and 
that she came out, with the ap- 
probation of her husband, a few 
hours in a day, to get up the 
money, which she could do much 
wicker than by working; but 
she promised me she would go 
home, and never attempt it again. 
If we were to suffer our poor to 
go out of the workhouse, as they 
595 
do in many parishes, instead of 
keeping them close, the greatest 
part of them would, by telling 
artful tales, get a considerable 
sum of money, which would be 
employed for the purposes of de- 
bauchery or intoxication. We 
endeavour to make our workhouse 
an house of industry ; for every 
one there hassomething cranother 
to do, and we keep them close to 
work, although they could not 
earn us a shilling a week: we 
conceive it to be conducive to 
their morals, That is generally 
known among the poor; and 
were it not for that, perhaps our 
house would have as many again 
inhabitants of the worst descrip- 
tion. We never let them go out 
of the workhouse but on a Satur- 
day afternoon, then they return 
at a certain time; and, too fre- 
quently, in that little time, many 
of them will beg, and some of 
them be so intoxicated, that they 
do not get home till the next 
morning. The master has a po- 
sitive order not to suffer one of 
them to come in if they exceed 
their time; they are then obliged 
to keep out, and make a fresh 
application to the churchwardens 
or overseers to come in again, or 
to go to a magistrate, and then 
they are subject to the same pro- 
vision. 
Do you allow them to go out 
on a Sunday ?—They are per- 
mitted to go to a place of worship : 
we feel a difficulty in forcing 
them all to goto Church. There 
was a woman, who used to go to 
a chapel in the City-road, as she 
said: one of our overseers was 
coming out in the evening after 
service, when he heard a voice, 
“Pray remember a poor blind 
2Q2 
