to a close. In February of the present year,
Mr. Hamilton, of the Treasury, Mr. Childers,
of the Admiralty, and Sir Richard Bromley, of
Greenwich Hospital, presented their joint
recommendation as to the exact nature of the
reforms, and the mode of carrying them out.

Let us sketch the whole plan, just as if it were
certain to be fulfilled. The present commissioners
of Greenwich Hospital are to be dispensed with,
and a much simpler governing authority established.
The management of the Hospital estates
is to be wholly severed from that of the
Hospital, and confided to a different set of persons;
and not only the estates but also the
funded property and the parliamentary grants,
making up the revenue to something over one
hundred and fifty thousand a year. Letting out
such of the old men as are still tolerably hearty,
the in-pensioners are to be limited to six hundred:
comprising the infirm, and such poor fellows
as have no friends and no other home to go to;
they will have a few additional comforts beyond
the present limit, and about two shillings a week
pocket-money instead of one. The Royal Naval
School for eight hundred boys, sons of seamen
and marines, is still to be supported out of the
Hospital revenues. The salaries of officers, the
wages of servants, the support and pocket-money
for six hundred pensioners, and the support
of the school, are estimated to cost about
seventy thousand a year; and even after all
these reforms, little more than one-fourth of this
amount will be spent really on the men for food,
clothing, and pocket-money. The total sum is
to be voted annually by, and subject to, the consent
of parliament, but is to be refunded to the
nation out of the Hospital estates—a precaution
which will give the nation a check over the
spending of the money. More than half the
revenue being thus unappropriated, it is to be
applied to pensions. A small sum, about four
thousand a year, is to go in pensions to a few
old admirals, captains, commanders, lieutenants,
masters, paymasters, and warrant officers. The
bulk of the money, however, is to be applied to
bettering the condition of the out-pensioners,
the old salts who have served the Queen (or
King) a due number of years, but who do not,
or are not to, reside within the walls of Greenwich
Hospital. The whole of these out-pensioners,
excluding those residing in the colonies,
are about twelve thousand in number, to whom
about a quarter of a million sterling is voted
annually by parliament in the form of pensions
—varying from two or three up to fifteen or
twenty shillings a week, according to rank,
length of service, exemplary conduct, &c. About
fourteen hundred of these out-door veterans are
over seventy years of age; so that the total list
will lessen every year. Extra pensions, beyond
those at present fixed, are to be paid to such of
the pensioners as are fifty-five years old and
upwards, and have been in the receipt of ordinary
pensions for at least five years. This class
includes about four thousand men; but provision
is to be made for augmentation to five
thousand. This additional pension, beyond that
at present received, is to be fivepence per day to
begin with, increasing up to ninepence. These
extra pensions will absorb about fifty thousand
a year. Of the men who are at present in the
Hospital, but will quit it under the new system,
all will be placed on the same improved position
as those who are now out. Gratuities, equal to
one year's pay of their husbands, are to be paid
to the widows of seamen and marines who may
be killed or drowned in her Majesty's service.

But what will become of the magnificent structure,
when only six hundred old fellows are domiciled
in it, with twenty officers and a hundred
nurses in attendance to see to their wants? Until
the next war there will be long corridors and
ranges of rooms unoccupied; but when broken
arms and legs, and shattered faces and bodies,
begin again, there will be accommodation for
seventeen hundred additional inmates, or two
thousand three hundred beds altogether. The
six hundred, already spoken of, would comprise
those who are too infirm to leave the
Hospital, and others who really have nowhere
else to go to—men who have no relations, domestic
ties, or regular occupations beyond the
walls of the place which has sheltered them
during a long course of years.

Many persons ask, and have asked for some
years past, why should not Greenwich Hospital
be made in some way available for invalided
merchant seamen, whose sixpences in past days
helped to create the funds? Merchant seamen,
it is true, who have been wounded in action with
the ship of an enemy, or in fight against a rebel
or pirate, are eligible for admission; but these,
of course, are exceptional cases. The final arrangements
are not yet legislatively sanctioned;
and there seems much reason to wish that,
either through the Seamen's Hospital Society or
some other channel, the claims of merchant seamen
should meet with recognition—before the
noble funds are irrevocably voted away.

PATTY'S TEA-PARTIES.

CHAPTER I.

"ROBERT, I am disgusted with her."

"Why, Patty? She is very pretty."

"I allow she is pretty."

"And elegant."

"Yes, she is elegant."

"And dresses beautifully."

" Beautifully! Is it not a sin and a shame
to spend the money she must spend on her
dress."

"Ah, that is it, Patty. You are angry because
she is always finer than you."

"Now, Robert! as for that, I can be as fine
as she, if I chose to be wicked and run you into
debt; and moreover, I would not be as fine. I
flatter myself I have better taste."

"You have been flattering yourself a good
deal of late, Patty."

"And why not? when a person comes and
settles herself down here amongst us all, a
stranger, with few introductions, and begins to