SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC HISTORY 



paradox. The justices had fixed no minimum subsistence rate, so that 

 there was a wide margin for discretion. Possibly this was better than a 

 rate fixed too high, Uke that in Cambridgeshire, where in consequence 

 wages were 20 per cent, higher than in the adjoining parts of the county of 

 Hertford," 



The Poor Law of 1834 caused indoor rehef to shrink even faster 

 than outdoor relief. At the end of the Lady Day quarter of 1843 there 

 were 4,334 indoor paupers and 13,735 out.* On i July 1851 1,431 paupjers 

 were in the workhouses and 9,014 received relief outside.'' From this time 

 the figures remain fairly constant until about 1877, when the number 

 shrinks.^ In 1878 the indoor paupers were 1,661 and the outdoor 7,1 14.* 

 Ten years later the outdoor relief had increased slightly in comparison with 

 the indoor ; the figures were 1,275 and 7,325." In 1899 there were 1,272 

 indoor paupers and 6,2 1 8 relieved outside the workhouse." 



After Gilbert's Act came into force the burden of the poor rate made 

 economy the one aim of the parishes. Presumably this suggested the 

 farming of the poor, of which we find mention first about 1790. At 

 St. Albans both indoor and outdoor relief was farmed before 1793- In 

 1774 after a brief space of parish management the farm was ^(^400 a 

 year.^^ The parish provided house and furniture, and the contractor fed 

 and clothed the thirty-nine inmates, relieved the out-pensioners and dealt 

 with the casuals ; the farmer lost j^ioo a year in spite of the paupers' 

 earnings.^' At Barnet the poor were farmed for j^2 3 a month." At 

 Redbourn the sum was j^25 a month from 1796 ; but the system had been 

 used earlier. There is no evidence that it was continued after the reform 

 of the Poor Law. 



Pauperism in Hertfordshire was small in degree in the 17th century. 

 But from its position the county was certain to suffer from vagrancy, 

 passing in and out of London. Along the great roads the parishes were 

 heavily burdened. The constables of Barnet in 1639 returned that they 

 had ' whippt and past 8 men and 3 women in the last month to Bedford, 

 Stokenchurch, Maidstone and ye Strond.' " At Northaw one vagrant was 

 punished in March and one in February." 



The general increase of vagrancy led to the Act of 1662, which made 

 poor people removable from a parish which they had newly entered within 

 forty days on the warrant of two justices. This must have increased the 

 poor rates of the Hertfordshire parishes and thrown much work on the 

 parish officers. By the end of the 17th century the figures of vagrancy had 

 risen to something more like the modern scale. Seventy or eighty casuals 

 passed through the St. Albans workhouse in a year." The roads were 

 infested not only by the trampers of the county, but by the out-of-works, 

 the casuals and the criminals of London. In 1834 Hoddesdon was 

 ' oppressed with vagrants in a measure scarcely credible owing to the strict 



^ Poor Law Rep. (18 18), zz. ^ Accts. and Papers, 1844 (4Z), xl, iz3. 



' Ibid. 185Z (1461), xxiii, 39. 



^ Ibid, i860 (2675), xxvii, 176 et seq. ; 1868 (4197), xxviii, 260. 



" Ibid. 1878-9 (c), Z37Z, 296 i" Pari. Papers (1887) (77 A), Ixx, 129. 



11 Ibid. (1899) (100 B), Ixxxiii (i), 619. 12 gir F. M. Eden, State of Poor, ii, Z71. 



1' Ibid. " Ibid. 274. i^ g p pom. Chas. I, ccccxviii, zl (vi). 



18 Ibid. (viii). !'■ Sir F. M. Eden, State of Poor, ii, 271-4. 



219 



