The Sun.
London, England, 1866-06-18 00:00:00

46' 2. Availing themselves of a law passed through
the efforts of Mr. ',pH in the year 1864 for the
certifying of Industrial Schools in connection with
the Poor-law Board, Lord Petre and others, acting
on behalf of the Roman Catholics of. London, made
application to at least 12 London unions, request-
ing that the Roman Catholic children in their
workhouses might be sent to North Hyde or Nor-
wood, remaining, of course, subject to inspection.
The answer was a refusal. The documents are at
this moment in the keeping of the Poor-law Board.

3. A poor Roman Catholic woman, dying in
the prison of Milbank, made a written declaration,
attested by the prison authorities, constituting

.her
education in her own faith. After her death they
were placed in the workhouse. Mr. Langdale ap-
plied personally for the children, more than once
undertaking their charge on his own resources, and
engaging that they should remain open to inspec-
tion. The answer was a refusal.

'4. In Aug., 1859, the Poor-lavi Board, which,
I believe, has acted with justice in the whole matter,
issued its celebrated "order," directing the masters
of workhouses, on the admission of crphans, to
ascertain, when possible, the religious creed pro-
fessed by their parents, enacting that no other creed
should be taught the children till they are 12 years
of age, and ordering, a thing of paramount im-
portance, that a " Creed Register" should be kept.
The Poor Law Guardians either refused to act on
this order or frustrated it by passive opposition. In
London, this course was taken, Ibelieve, universally,
although the law officers of the Crown expressed
their opinion that in issuing that order the Board
had not gone beyond its powers.
" ' 5. In 1861 Mr. Ewart moved for a return spe-
cifying the religion of the inmates of workhouses.
The Catholic children in the London workhouses
that return stated to be 382 in number. The Roman
Catholic clergy had, with all their efforts, succeeded
only in visiting 103. The remainder had been kept
from them.

" 6. But that return, as regards Roman Catholic
children, cannot possibly have recorded anything
like their real numbers. It shows that in the metro-
politan workhouses the adult Roman Catholics are
to the adult Protestants as one in seven. There is
not the slightest reason to assume that among
children the population of Roman Catholics is smaller.
Much more probably it is larger. Now, in 29 schools
(workhouse, separate, and district) the number of
children is returned as being 7,780. Reckoning the
Roman Catholic children as one-seventh of that
number, they must be more than 1,100, of whom
but 103 were visited by their clergy.
" ' 7. Roman Catholics,when they complain of this
wrong, are sometimes invited to name the children
whose positions they consider unjust. But their
specified complaint is that, while they have a thou-
sand means of knowing that the little captives exist,
all special knowledge is, as to individuals, in multi:
tudes of cases withheld from them by the perverse
but persevering ingenuity of guardians. Let a Creed
Register be kept, and the invitation need not be
made a second time. This is what the 'August or-
der' commands.
" 'B. All that is permitted is this—a 4 'ABU on
the part of the Roman Catholic priest in order to
give instruction' to any Roman Catholic in-
mate of a workhouse who may choose to send for
him. But who is there, Catholic or Protestant,
who does not know that those who most need the
services of a clergyman often be the last to
send for him? What, then, is to be expected from
a frightened child surrounded by a large majority
who perhaps hold his faith in aversion? Who is
ignorant that the casual ' visit' of a clergyman is
but poor protection against the temptation of a work-
house life? Who is ignorant that mere religious
Men, 'instruction,'
an d
yet i f
moreadeis not education?
children,given, is
made by habits,
y
not by maxims, or even catechisms ; and a child
must be brought up in a certain atmosphere of re-
ligion if his faith is to live. It is for this reason, no
b
that your article on Catholic education re-
markeddout that if what has been stated can be proved
Roman Catholic pauper children should have work-
houses or schools of their own. This is not a mat-
ter for special pleading ; such clerical visits are a
farce. The Rev. Mr. M'Quoin writes to say that
he has, under many difficulties, been visiting at a
workhouse—that of 'gasket— fo eight years, once
a week ; and ends by stating thatr out of 11 chil-
dren of Roman Catholic parents four had just in-
formed him that the remaining ten had turned.'
The meaning of this turning' of children in a work-
house may be illustrated by the case of a little girl,