C-i. V.] SICK POOR. 179 



ways selected to build them on, for fear of wasting any 

 that might be profitable. A clergyman mentioned a case 

 on which he was called to attend, to administer the rites 

 of religion, about three months ago. The family had been 

 attacked by fever : he found the father and four of the 

 children sick, and all together on one bed of moist rotten 

 straw nothing else under them : their sole covering was a 

 single fold of what is called a poverty-blanket (half wool, 

 half tow), which he was assured had been the only one 

 they had used for eight years. Their only attendant was 

 the fifth child, a girl eleven years old. No person would 

 come into the house. Their neighbours used to leave 

 some potatoes and occasionally some milk within a few 

 yards of the door, which, when they retired, the child took 

 in. This was their only support : medical attendance was 

 quite out of the question. In this condition the children 

 recovered; the father died. Their uncle, a man having 

 eight in his own family, and supporting them in great 

 poverty, took the children into his own house, and now 

 gives them a side of the fire and a place for their bed, 

 while they beg through the parish for food. 



Such is generally the fate of a family of orphans ; and 

 three clergymen, and all the other witnesses, agree that the 

 two cases above mentioned may be taken to represent the 

 condition of a very large proportion of the parishioners 

 when afflicted by sickness of a contagious nature. 



The witnesses mentioned four or five such cases existing 

 at present in the parish, and agree that a description of 

 one is a description of all. Two of the families have be- 

 tween them fourteen members, most of them at this mo- 

 ment sick. 



N 2 



