all want to see in the report of the Poor Law
Board is not, "Lo, we have spent so little upon,
and have saved so much as compared with the
year preceding out of, so many paupers;" but,
"Lo, we have really and efficiently relieved
in this Christian country so much undoubted
distress, and our help is still so much short of
completeness." The public would pay anything
for the real relief of the poor. An equalised
rate, even if it were ten times more than the tax
it would be, would be borne thankfully if it
did really remove the shame of beggars from the
streets, and did really purchase for us the real
"Christian knowledge," that no moderately
deserving and striving person could possibly die
of cold and hunger. The Englishman is always
liberal in payment for a service he secures.
He looks first at efficiency, and secondly at
cost; and as he sees need of very much further
amendment in a Poor Law system that cannot
stand the climate of the country, to say nothing
of its other faults, he grudges the cost of bad
service, and will grudge it, though in course of
years it be reduced until the Board rejoices in
the expenditure of half its present outlay on a
doubled population.

But the Board will not live to do that. It
must live with the life of the people whom it
serves, or it must inevitably die soon and give
place to something sturdier and wiser than
itself— something mindful above all things of
the solemn duty to be done.

PEDLARS' CONGRESS.

VATTEL informs us that there are three
varieties of congresses known in diplomacy. First,
there is the Congress of Princes, such as that of
Verona, where the regnants settle how
insurrections are to be put down; next, we have the
Congress of Plenipotentiaries, as that of
Aix-la-Chapelle; and lastly, the mixed Congress, where
princes and ambassadors form a diplomatic
potpourri. The erudite writer has entirely omitted
another Congress: the German Pedlars'
Congress, held every January and June.

Ehningen, the place where the Congress is
held, is situated at the foot of the Rauhe Alp,
in Würtemberg. It is possibly a shade dirtier
than other German villages, and an unusual
number of masterless pigs roam about its
narrow streets. Though assumed to contain
five thousand inhabitants, if you visit it at any
other period than that of the half-yearly
Congress, you will probably only meet the parish
priest's swineherd; for the entire population
lives by hawking. The Teutonic Cheap Jack
hails from Ehningen, and he and his fellows
attend every fair for hundreds of miles around.

As the period for the Congress arrives, all the
roads leading to Ehningen are thronged with
homeward-bound pedlars, their wives, and
children. They have to reckon up the profits of
the year, attend to parochial matters, marry
their daughters, and last, but not least, lay in
their wares for the coming season. The
Congress, in a word, is composed of commercial
gentlemen, who arrive from all parts of the
civilised world, to do business with men who can
scarcely write their own names, and find it a hard
matter to make both ends meet. Still, many of
these pedlars have a yearly credit amounting to
five thousand pounds. The traveller to any
large wholesale house would be supposed to
have neglected the interests of his masters
unless he took orders for at least twenty thousand
pounds at each Congress. As at least two
hundred travellers annually arrive at Ehningen
for orders, Vattel might have mentioned the
Congress without any derogation to diplomacy. The
most curious thing is, that, though this enormous
amount of credit is granted to men only
one remove from pauperdom, very few bad debts
are made. The pedlars have their pride as well
as the richest merchant, and starve themselves
in order to meet their payments.

There is only one inn at Ehningen, where the
travellers dine together, lodging in the private
houses. German commercial gents represent
the fast type of the nation, and though this
class is much alike all over the world, indulging
to an extreme in loud patterns and heavy jewellery,
the Germans surpass their brethren by
their insane love of smashing everything. Mine
host of the Traube can tell you many a quaint
story about his guests: how, on one occasion,
four of them destroyed property valued at eight
hundred and thirty florins, which they paid for
without a murmur.

So soon as the commercial gentleman has established
himself, he hires a young girl, representing
the Boots of civilisation, who leads him to
the houses of his various customers. The
female population of Ehningen are peculiar for
a damp umbrella smell, by which you can know
them all through Germany. Bäbele then wades
along through the slush, and stops before the
first house, where the new arrival forms the end
of a long queue of travellers standing on the
rickety wooden ladder leading to the door. It
is the fashion at Ehningen that the gentlemen
bagmen should pay their respects to their
customers, and inquire at what hour they will be
pleased to look at samples.

At length, our special traveller's turn arrives,
and he enters the low-roofed smoky sleeping-room.
Here the host probably offers him a
hand odorous of the pigsty, while madame
is tidying herself at the glass, in short petticoats
which have once been cleaner. The
traveller begins by inquiring after the health of
all the family, gradually working round to the
object of his visit. Can Hans Michel, or, as the
case may be, do anything in calicoes? Hans
Michel appeals to Matchen for her advice, and
she replies that they are full of calico up to the
eyes, but there can be no harm in having a look.
Thereupon Hans consults a very dirty piece of
paper covered with hieroglyphics, and at length
expresses his opinion that the traveller may call
next Thursday week at two P.M. The traveller
books the hour, and proceeds to the next house
on the same errand. When all the visits have
been paid, the traveller generally finds that he