RELAXATION OF THE LAW 435 



best stock, the largest commons or wastes to build cottages, and the most 

 woods for them to burn and destroy, ... to the great discouragement of 

 parishes to provide stocks, where it is liable to be devoured by strangers." 

 To these wanderers were applied the regulations for the removal of vagabonds. 

 Any person " likely to be chargeable to the pariah," unless he had acquired 

 a settlement by a residence of 40 days, might be removed to his birthplace. 



On this Act was built up a mass of settlement law, which occupied the 

 time of Sessions and Assizes, wasted the money of ratepayers, and, worst of 

 all, fettered labour to one spot. But the policy of the legislature seems to 

 have been to encourage and facilitate the relief of those who satisfied the 

 settlement test. The cost of the Poor Law increased so rapidly that, in order 

 to check what the Act of 1691 (3 and 4 Wm. and Mary, c. 11) styles the 

 frivolous pretences of the overseers, controlling powers were given to the 

 vestry and the justices. The control of the magistrates only led to larger 

 expenditure. To reduce the growing cost a test of destitution was authorised. 

 By the Act of 1722 (9 Geo. I. c. 7) churchwardens and overseers were empowered 

 to provide houses for the maintenance of the poor, to contract for the employ- 

 ment of the inmates, and to apply the surplus of their earnings to the reduction 

 of the rates. If any applicant refused to enter the house, he was not 

 entitled to relief of any kind from the rates. The offer of a living was made 

 entirely conditional on his entering the workhouse. 



The Act of 1722 effectively checked the spread of pauper relief wherever 

 it was adopted. But the legislation of George III. moved in the opposite 

 direction of increased laxity. No doubt the great rise in the price of pro- 

 visions from 1765 to 1774, 1 the disturbance of trade by the wars of 1756-63 

 and 1774-83, the invention of the steam-engine and the spinning-jenny, the 

 rapid growth of population, presented the old problems of unemployment 

 and poverty in an acuter form. As civilisation advanced, humanitarian 

 sentiment asserted new claims, and social legislation occupied a larger share 

 of the attention of Parliament. The need for detailed information respecting 

 the cost of Poor Relief led to the Act of 1776, which required overseers to 

 furnish returns of their assessments and expenditure. From these returns 

 it appeared that the actual outlay in that year was 1,530,800. During the 

 early years of the reign, numerous amendments were passed in the administra- 

 tion of the Poor Law. But the most important changes were made by the 

 Act of 1782 " for the Better Relief and Employment of the Poor," usually 

 known as " Gilbert's Act " (22 George III. c. 83). In any parish, or union 

 of parishes, which adopted the provisions of the Act, the management of the 

 poor was vested in a visitor and guardians. Poor relief was thus taken 

 out of the hands of the overseers, whose duties were restricted to collecting 

 and accounting for the rates. For the impotent poor, houses were to be 

 provided which were in effect almshouses, though they unfortunately inherited 

 the traditions of the old Houses of Correction and workhouses. The most 

 serious alterations affected the able-bodied. The workhouse test of destitu- 

 tion, or of voluntary pauperism, was partially discontinued. In any parish 

 where poor persons, able and willing to work but unable to find employment, 

 applied to the guardian, he was obliged, under a penalty, to find them work 

 conveniently near the residence of the applicants, to receive their earnings, 

 to apply the money to their maintenance, to make up any deficiency out 

 of the rates, to hand over any surplus to the earners. Alone among 

 wage-earners, the able-bodied poor had not to exert themselves to find 

 work or conduct their own bargains for wages. They were secure of a 

 living, not if they worked their best, but if they worked hard enough 

 and well enough to escape punishment. Nothing depended on their own 



1 For 1755-64, the average price of wheat was 37s. 6d. a quarter ; for 1765-74, 51s. a 

 juarter. The price rose 35 per cent. 



