The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser. — 1838-07-20 (Liverpool, Merseyside, England)

HORRID DEATH-THE.WHIG POOR LAW,  The past week has added another victim to the appalling list of legalized murders perpetrated under the sanction of the Whig Poor Law Amendment Act, and the Town of Newcastle has been the scene of the atrocious deed. We shall not enlist the feelings of our readers in the cause further than the simple narrative of the facts stated by the witnesses on the inquest warrants—these facts supply a commentary on the abominable system which will sink deep into the hearts of thousands. The deceased was an old woman between seventy and eiahty years of aye; her name was Elizabeth Graham; and she had for some time procured a precarious and scanty subsistence by selling threads and tapes which she carried in a basket. The extent of her means from this source must have been extremely small, and the wonder to us is huw she contrived to survive the severe and protracted winter which has just passed. She was found by a policeman on duty lying on her side in a coal-house, and it would appear from the evidence of one of the witnesses that Mr. Robins, the keeper of the Mendicity office, to whom she was in the first instance taken, "had often been bothered with her" but he had never relieved her "evenjbr a single night!!" She was thence taken to St. Nicholas' Workhouse where it was found that she was not unknown to the keeper, Mr. Rutherford, who it appears bad, in the morhadkept given her pocket some bread, which being unable to eat she in her all day, and it was found there the eer Workhouse, the tbhuethWehhig P had refused atwo, admit be stated,itherinto having deprivede hint of all discretionary power. The consequence was that the poor old woman was taken to the police station in the Manors where she was put into a cell and•there suffered to remain till death put an end to her sufferings. Our hearts swbll at the recital of her woes, and over her bier we would join • the heads of the promoters andn tiprayer of vengeance on advocatesnfteofha system so repugnant to every generous feeling individual has for as well as so contrary to the right which every support in the community where Providence has thought fi to place him. From the evidence of the surgeon it appeared she had been afflicted with a cancerous disease, which was sufficient to account for death; he was therefore of opinion that she bad not died of hunger. The jury, after consultation returned a verdict to the following effect :—We find an unanimous verdict of "died by the visitation of God;" but we unanimously regret that no better provision is made for people who are fou-nci-uut place, rtheseh whether t r those circumstances.who have Aid the firs beg to suggest, in the w care of the poor-houses might not be induced to act with more kindness to people who are so absolutely destitute that they might die as they are passing through the streets. And, secondly, whether it was proper in this place (the police station) to put a woman, in a dying state, into a cell, to die as a dog, without other provision being made for her than for those who are brought in as prisoners, saving the attention which was afforded her by the policemen themselves.—Newcastle Journal.  A B ference between the diet of the ancients and that of us moderns is very striking. The ancient Greeks and Romans used no alcoholic liquor, it being unknown to them; nor coffee, nor tea, nor chocolate, nor sugar, nor even butter ; for Galen informs us he had seen butter but once in his life. They were ignorant of the greater number of our tropical spices, as clove, nutmeg, mace, ginger, Jamaica pepper, curry, pimento. They used neither buckwheat, nor French beans, nor spinach, nor sago, tapioca, salep, arrow-root, nor potato, or its varieties; nor even the common, but a sort of marshgrown, bean ; nor many of our fruits, as the orange, tamarind, nor American maize. On the other hand, they ate substances which we now neglect—the mallow, the herb oxtongue, the sweet acorn, the lupin. They used greatly radish, lettuce, sorrel. They liked the flesh of wild asses, of little dogs, of the dormouse, of the fox, of the bear. They ate the flesh of parroquets and other rare birds, and of lizards. They were fond of a great ir any fish and shell-fish which we now hold in no esteem. They employed as sea; sonings, rue and assafcetida.—Dr. Dick's Diet and Regimen.