of the workhouses." We have no doubt of
Earl Grey's having been entirely misapprehended
in this matter. The reports of the
Board for the years referred to (1849 and
1850), which we have since perused, show,
that, with certain exceptions, (chiefly orphan
girls from the Irish workhouses), emigrants
sent away under the auspices of the Emigration
Commissioners were not drawn from
that class at all. It is certain that the reports
from the destinations of Government
emigrants are, on the whole, favourable to them
personally, and testify to the diligence and
judgment with which they have been selected.

So much as to the matter of fact; but,
although the " refuse " of workhouses can
never be a desirable, or, indeed, practicable
source for emigrants; yet, under certain
limitations, workhouses are not the worst
feeders of the Colonial labour market. Indeed,
it is not at all certain whether able-
bodied paupers, or even the least venal
among convicts, do not turn out better
colonists than persons who are able to muster a
portion of the expense of voyage and outfit,
and who get the rest from the Emigration
Commissioners. The steady, hard-working
labourer has very little chance of raising the
three or four pounds necessary to take him
out of the scene of his local privations; but
the restless rogue, who is continually giving
all sorts of trouble to all sorts of parochial
officers and private families, is readily
"assisted" to the antipodes by them with
subscriptions. A steady, well-conducted man
seldom requires to emigrate from necessity:
he gets well employed at home. Many may
and do choose to emigrate, but they seldom
have occasion to do so with the assistance of
the Board. Again, a large proportion of
convicts sentenced to transportation, consist of
men not interior in any respects to the average
of the working-classes. They have been led by
sudden or temporary temptation into crime;
but, after undergoing the system of prison
discipline now in force, prove, when removed
to another part of the globe, well-conducted
and useful settlers.

Of course, it would be a miracle if, out of
the million and a half of passengers shipped
for the Colonies (either directly by the
Commissioners or under their general supervision),
during the last six years, the Emigration
authorities had not been grossly deceived in
some, and had not made mistakes about others.
But investigation has proved to us, that the
trust reposed in them in the application of
the funds for emigration, set aside from Colonial
land sales, has been faithful and judicious.
That they have been more vigilant than those
concerned in voluntary and independent
emigration, is clearly proved by a parliamentary
return just issued. It appears that from 1847
to 1851 (both years inclusive), seven thousand
one hundred and twenty-nine emigrant vessels
sailed from the United Kingdom. Of the five
thousand nine hundred and sixty-four of these
ships which were despatched from ports under
the superintendence of the Board, thirty were
wrecked; the per-centage of loss being one in
every one hundred and ninety-nine ships; but,
of the nine hundred and thirteen ships despatched
free of their supervision, nearly three
times that proportion were wrecked; namely
—thirteen, or one in every seventy vessels.
Of the two hundred and fifty-two ships sent
directly out and chartered by the Commissioners,
only one was lost. As to passengers,
out of a quarter of a million and a half of
souls, no fewer were lost, by shipwreck alone,
than one thousand and forty-three; but not a
single life was lost by the ships chartered by
the Land and Emigration Commissioners.

The misfortune inseparable from Official
Emigration is, that it offers fewer facilities
and less encouragement to voluntary, well-
conditioned, and intelligent emigrants, than to
the less estimable classes of the community.
It is fortunate for the former, that it is
within the range of the new system of Family
and Loan Colonisation.

A MELANCHOLY PLACE.

IN the list of melancholy offices— not a very
numerous list, we are glad to say— which
have to be filled by certain individuals, who
undertake to perform the corresponding
duties— some, from affection; some, as a matter
of principle; some, from compulsion; and the
rest for a fee or salary— there are few that
convey a more sombre impression to our
imagination than the very ancient post of the
Curfew-Toller. It is of so time-honoured a
standing that, as extremes meet, time has
since gone such lengths as to forget the date
of its origin. Though most historians attribute
the establishment of the tyrannical
law of the Curfew, to William the Conqueror,
there does not appear to be an adequate
authority for the statement. That so
monotonous, despotic, and dolorous a duty, however,
as the duty of ordering all grown-up people off
to bed, like children, or creatures in menageries,
at the tolling of the bell, would be
accepted from any liking for the place, is
beyond belief; we are therefore obliged to
arrive at the conclusion, that it was on account
of the fees or salary attached to it. Well;
we may suppose that a similar influence
operated throughout the whole course of
"the good old times," since we find that the
"place " has never been vacant, down to
the present day!

In the article entitled A Tower of
Strength, published in our one hundred and
fourth Number, fifth volume, page fifteen,
we were so unfortunate as to omit all mention
of the Curfew-Toller. We now beg the
reader to pardon the oversight, and to do us
the favour to imagine him seated in a snug
private apartment beneath his belfry, in the
Tower of London, in company with the
Gentleman Headsman, over a glass of fine old port: