576 EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



CXLVIL INSTITUTION FOR RECLAIMING VICIOUS 

 CHILDREN. 



In the neighborhood of Berne, likewise, I visited another 

 philanthropic institution, in which I was much interested. A 

 few persons had contributed the means of purchasing a valuable 

 and suitable estate for the purpose of establishing an agricultural 

 school for vagabond boys, or those who have been convicted at 

 the courts of law, and who, after suffering the legal penalties 

 of their crimes, and being released from prison without character, 

 without friends, without a home, or the means of procuring an 

 honest living, seem to have no alternative other than that of 

 returning to their former course of idleness, beggary, and crime. 

 This undertaking is thus far eminently successful ; they having 

 found an individual of high intellectual and moral attainments, 

 and of indomitable resolution and great disinterestedness, who 

 devotes himself to the reclamation and education of these poor 

 and wretched children. About sixty individuals are now under 

 his care. The farm is well cultivated, and chiefly by hand and 

 spade labor. The most remarkable features about the establish- 

 /ment are the absence of all peculiar dress or external badges by 

 v which the boys could be distinguished j and of all fences or 

 bars by which the escape of the boys might be prevented. The 

 boys are divided into parties of ten or twelve, who work together 

 under the direction of a foreman. The whole discipline of the 

 institution is moral ; and their punishments for irregularities, 

 idleness, or other faults, are of a kind much more to affect the 

 mind and conscience of the pupils than their bodies. 



CXLVIII. CONDITION OF THE POOR AND LABORING 



CLASSES. 



Europe abounds with philanthropic institutions ; and there 

 exists a large demand for them. In Switzerland a society has 

 been formed in the agricultural districts, under the patronage of 



