The Express.
London, England, 1866-01-01 00:00:00

BRITANNIA.

Tem Ramo, OLD DADDY LONOLZOR AND SIR BEGIRT
CIRCUS; OR, THE RACE FOR THE GOLDEN APPLES.—
M. and Mdme. Storizoobach.-Blfgoor BonaL—Olmar.—Showor
of Golden Rafe,—And MK& TUX MORMON'S DAUGHTER.

LONDON. MONDAY. JANUARY 1.

IT will be seen from the report given in another
column that a reform which we have frequently
insisted on as necessary is promised in the admi-
nistration of the Houseless Poor Act. One of the
many discrepancies between the treatment of va-
grants at different metropolitan workhouses is to be
removed ; and, assuming that the several boards of
guardians will consider themselves bound by the
votes of their delegates, the food supplied will
henceforth be alike in every case. We have reason
to believe that this beneficial change has been for
some time in contemplation, and that a scheme for
a uniform dietary had the approval of the Poor-law
Board long before the meeting of Saturday. That
casual paupers should be fed or starved at the
caprice of parochial guardians, that the fare should
vary from hot cocoa or soup to cold water, from
bread and cheese or bread and milk to bread alone,
has been a manifest injustice and an undoubted
violation of the spirit of the act. To ensure uni-
formity it was wisely determined to take the
opinions of the several parishes, and to give official
sanction to the scheme of diet recommended by the
majority, instead of rousing susceptibilities which
are sufficiently sensitive by issuing a formal order
from Whitehall.

A bare record of the result of Saturday's con-
ference gives but a faint notion of the proceedings
at St. Martin's Hall. The parochial delegates
were, in nearly every instance, chairmen or vice-
chairmen of their several boards, and the effect of
this aggregation of parochial authority was an irre-
pressible, turbulent, and disorderly meeting. Pro-
poeitions to reduce the quantity of food were
received with loud laughter and cheers, and several
attempts were made to hector Mr. Farnall into
ruling as chairman according to the wishes of a
vociferous minority. Some speakers indulged in
wandering autobiographical reminiscences until
shouted down ; some put forward their love for
the poor as a reason for denying them what
others declared to be cruelly short commons ;
and the meeting arrived by a series of circuitous
routes at a practical conclusion only through the
conciliatory skill and tact of the poor-law commis-
sioner. The proposed addition of a piece of cheese
to the hunch of bread given at supper was indig-
nantly denounced, some gentlemen insisting on the
state of luxurious repletion is which homeless wan-
derers, as a rule, sought a night's shelter at a work-
house. Another section of delegates considered
that an allowance of gruel would be more comforting
than cheese, and one gentleman was coughed down
while indulging in vague denunciations of the presi-
dent of the Poor-law Board for daring to suggest
"through an emissary" that it would be
for the common good if the various parish
authorities could agree among themselves. Mr.
Villiers was promptly exculpated from this terrible
charge by Mr. Farnall, who declared the meeting
to be convened on his personal authority as metro-
politan inspector, and it was eventually agreed that
gruel should be substituted for cheese. It may be
mentioned that the latter article of food was only
suggested to ensure something being added to dry
bread ; a benevolent wish which, it was decided by
a majority of two, should only be carried out in the
winter.
The theoretical effect of the resolutions and
amendments, of the statements and counter-state-
ments of Saturday, is that at every workhouse in
the metropolitan district the adult casual pauper
will receive six ounces of dry bread at night, and
six ounces of dry bread in the morning during the
summer months, and a like quantity with gruel or
porridge in the winter ; and that child vagrants under
nine years of age will have four ounces of bread with
half a pint of gruel on every night in the year.'
Another theoretical effect is, that all masters of
workhouses are to give adult casual paupers a
task of work before they leave in the morning ;
and it will be for those watching the opera-
tions of the act on behalf of the public to
see how far these resolutions are carried out.
Several workhouse masters declare it to be im-
possible to apply the labour test in their present
limited establishments ; one representative guardian
left the room during Saturday's debate "dis-
gusted," as he assured us, "at the disgraceful
inhumanity " of certain speeches ; and the very
small majority by which each proposal was carried
seemed to point to possible difficulties in the future.
Constant watching and frequent publicity will,
however, do much to ensure the uniformity agreed
to ; and in the absence of more stringent control
than the law at present allows to official authority,
it is to these sources we must look. An amusing
illustration of the garbled and prejudiced form in
which information respecting the working of the
act comes before the public is furnished in the re-
turns from workhouse masters recently published.
Many of these parish officers dislike a measure
which involves additional labour to themselves
and their subordinates, and on being asked for
their opinion, declared with great candour that they
considered the Houselesa Poor Act to be a mistake.
Their views have been paraded forth as coming
from " the authorities," and many people, misled
by the grandiloquent synonym for workhouse-
master, have taken as a judicial verdict what in
reality was part of the speech of a counsel for the
prosecution. The best comment on the act is to be
found, not in the unsupported assertion of this or