occupation has been found most valuable."
Then there is a little fund, out of which the
boys and girls get little payments for work
that they do. How much better all this than
a system which should take the boys out of
the streets to learn "Scripture History," and
then turn them into them again to pick
pockets! It is surely discreditable to the
town that such a school should be hampered
for want of pecuniary assistance—monitors,
for instance, would be such an aid. And
then, the school also suffers from—what does
the reader suppose?—want of police surveillance
in the neighbourhood! The expenses
of the school we are speaking of, during the
past year, were two hundred and forty-four
pounds nineteen shillings and sixpence half-
penny; the annual subscriptions amounted
only to one hundred and twenty-nine pounds
twelve shillings and sixpence, and there is a
balance, &c., of nine pounds five shillings and
fivepence due to the treasurer. Yet it gives
an education to "between three hundred and
four hundred children, about two-thirds of
whom are receiving daily instruction, and
some industrial training."

Let us next look at the question of "Industrial
Feeding Schools," which Miss Carpenter
defines to be proper for the children "whom
the Free Day School fails to influence." We
are now pretty well arrived at the "lower
deep" of misery, and have to deal with the
vagrant of vagrants—with children whom
their own parents bring up to crime—the
rejected of unions, and the elected of gaols.
Let us look through the darkness and watch
what manner of figures are there. "A boy of
fourteen" meets the eye, who recently told
the alderman on the bench that he did not
know "what an oath is, what the Testament
is, what prayers are, what God is, what the
devil is. I sweeps the crossing" he added—
summing up his position, moral and social, in
the universe, in that one sentence. We look
next at a teacher's journal, and see "a bright
black–eyed little S.," who "seems thoroughly
established in his vagrant habits." Then, we
come to the case of a child whose stepmother
did not seem willing that it should go to an
industrial school. And Miss Carpenter fairly
admits that this class of children are beyond
the pale. Mere Free Day Schools, she thinks,
would scarcely do anything here. Their
attendance is not regular enough; they are in
the abyss of wretchedness as regards
circumstances, and what can save them from crime
and the gaol? An attempt was made in
Aberdeen, in 1841, it being then known
that not less than a thousand persons were
"wandering about, preying on the
inhabitants;" that three hundred and twenty-
eight children were vagabondizing the county;
while the superintendent of the city police
testified that "upwards of two hundred
and eighty children" were known to him as
common "beggars and common thieves."
On the 1st of October, 1841, a Feeding
School was opened in the town—a dozen
scholars brought in, and told that they
would be fed and taught, and allowed to
depart when they pleased, provided they did not
again resort to begging. The immediate effect
was good, but many withdrew from the
school, unwilling to bear the discipline. At
last, the promoters resolved to get magisterial
sanction for their plan—the magistrates
authorised the police to apprehend all begging
children, and bring them to the school. And
on the 19th of May, 1845, a haul was made,
accordingly, and seventy-five collected, of
whom only four could read. "They were in
the lowest condition," as of course the reader
is prepared to learn; they were rebellious;
but they were sternly informed that begging
would not be tolerated, and here food and
teaching were offered. The plan appears to
have been strikingly successful; and what
magic was there here? why should the country
shudder in a cowardly manner over details
of horror—when a little money and a little
courage will do so much? Aberdeen has
done an act of real charity and good sense
here, blessed itself and blessed these poor
vagrants. The poor must be taught, somehow,
if society means to exist: we hear, to be
sure, that there are parents who can, but will
not, educate them—who wilfully train them,
in crime for their own purposes. At present,
therefore, the children of such as these go to
gaol. But, suggests Miss Carpenter, why not
get an act of the legislature, authorising the
magistrates to send all such children to an
Industrial School at the expense of their
parents? Why not? We are not aware that
it would in any way interfere with the
grouse.

Miss Carpenter notices here an objection of
somebody's to Feeding Schools, on the ground
that they interfere with the Government, by
taking on themselves the duties of the unions.
Respectability, we know, always has the ready
phrase of "the union" on its consolatory
tongue: unhappily, however, the unions do
not relieve the wants of all the destitute at
this time. They perform, to be sure, one odd
office, according to Miss Carpenter; they
serve as coins to certain experienced offenders,
who commit acts of violence there, that they
may be sent for a week or so to some favourite
gaol. But surely no Poor Law nor any
neglect of anybody's should be allowed to
interfere with such efforts for the benefit of the
wretched, and the consequent benefit of the
whole country, as these detailed above. In
all such cases, legislative aid is wanted. It is
wanted to save children from parents who are
infamous; to enforce the attendance of the
children at such places of reform, to apprehend
vagabondizing children throughout the
country. It is wanted, in fact, for the
performance of all such duties as a Government
ought to discharge.

At present, however, "the only school
provided in Great Britain by the State for her