

CH. VI.] VAGRANCY AND MENDICITY. 191 



The chief cause of vagrancy, said one witness, origi- 

 nates in the minute subdivision of the land. If the chil- 

 dren of vagrants could get employment, they would accept 

 it, and would hire at fifteen shillings a year rather than 

 continue begging. In general they live much better than 

 those who remain at their homes, even when the latter are 

 in employment. 



An able-bodied beggar would get from one to two 

 stones of potatoes in the day more in fact than he can 

 consume. Those who have families get much more ; they 

 sell the surplus of their collections, and purchase clothes, 

 tobacco and soap. 



The witnesses state, that there are many vagrants who 

 return home richer than when they left it, and that no in- 

 stances are known of their dying from starvation, though 

 many have contracted diseases, such as low typhus fevers, 

 from the badness or scarcity of their food, of which they 

 eventually died. They live longer in general than work- 

 ing labourers. 



A vagrant is never refused lodging by the poor cottier 

 or householder, which the clergyman of the parish consi- 

 ders as highly prejudicial to the poor : the beggars thus 

 spread diseases and fevers, and often circulate false reports 

 and excite rebellious feelings. The people are fond of 

 listening to them, and the beggars oftener call at the 

 poor man's house than at the rich man's. 



The charity of the richer classes is exerted more in em- 

 ploying more workmen than they require than in giving 

 alms. The poor give ten times as much as the rich, in 

 proportion to their means. 



The idea of the people is, that what is given in charity 

 never shortens the quantity of what a man possesses. 





