Vruniurial,

SOCIAL SCIENCE AT LIVERPOOL. SOCIAL SCIENCE AT LIVERPOOL.

The National Association for the Promotion of Social Science met at Liverpool on Monday, according to the announcements long since pub- lished. Lord John Russell, the President for the year' accompanied by Lady John Russell, had arrived on the preceding day, the guests of Mr. William Brown. Lord Brougham, Lord Carlisle, Mr. Monckton Mikes, Lord Shaftesbury, Sir James Stephens, Sir John Pakington, and a host of other distinguished men arrived in due course. The first general meeting was held in St. George's Hall, three thou- sand persons being present, and there Lord John Russell delivered an inaugural address from the chair. He divided his theme into five heads, and plunging at once into business, discussed them in order. 1. Law Reform. Last year the subject that created the greatest interest was the Bankruptcy Law. The upshot of the discussion was embodied in bill, of which Lord John stated the provisions. "In the first place the bill consolidates and amends all the statute law relating to bankruptcy and to insolvency. It is proposed that the Insolvent Court of London and the separate insolvent jurisdictions of the county courts should be abolished, and that the law of bankruptcy and insolvency should be administered by one tribunal. It is not meant to contend by this proposal that there is no difference between bankruptcy and insolvency. The merchant whose expectations have been frustrated by a sudden fall m the price of silk, or a sudden rise in the price of tea, is evidently in a very different position from a man of little or no property, who has obtained coy credit, and become embarrassed by living at an extravagant rate. but there are many cases which border closely on bankruptcy, and yet are ranged under insolvency, or which border on insolvency, and yet 21!I ranged under bankruptcy. There can be no reason why one court should not deal with both subjects, and decide for themselves the proper eta-

f the transactions brought under their notice. There is no greater

ter of 1. shis country than the multiplicity of courts, causing delay, a nee, onfusion, and frequently injustice. In the same view of egep -licitycand equality, it is proposed to abolish the distinction between the bacier and no.n-t r. A landowner,. who is a shareholder in a company, ang a physician who the bin skill in the shape of prescription, would be treated-by the bill in t e same way as a partner in a mercantile house, or an st,theeary who deals in drugs. Nor is it easy to justify the distmetions

now made. In Scotland, where one court administers law and .5;quiiethyartocthe satisfaction of that enlightened people, the distinction I speak of does not exist. I hope the Association will approve of this portion of the biJL Perhaps the most important portion of the proposed change is that which relates to private agreements among creditors. Agreements signed in theshape of deeds or memoranda by a majority in number and four-fifths value will be held obligatory on creditors who have not signed. Thus „,

-- erehants will be enabled to do in the face of the law, and with the assist- ance of the law, that which they have hitherto done apart from the law and in despair of the law. Supposing, however, private arrangements to fail and adjudication to ensue, it is proposed that an official assignee should in- stantly take possession of all the property of the bankrupt. Within four- teen days after adjudication the creditors are to meet, and when they have proved their debts they are to proceed to the election of a creditor's assignee, who is to be the sole assignee of the bankruptcy. In Scotland, the custom is to apply to the Court for the appointment of an interim factor,

who keeps the property till the election of a trustee. It is thought, but not without doubt, that the maintenance of the official assig- nee of England is preferable to the adoption of the provisions of the Scotch law. It is in this way that the committee have endea- voured to keep distinct the mercantile and judicial elements in bankruptcy. While on the one hand they have left in the hands of mercantile men that which mercantile men are as competent to perform as official men, and have a greater interest in performing speedily and well than official men can have, they have avoided the opposite error of vesting judicial functions in the hands of creditors." He passed from this subject to the consolidation of the law, citing as instances of its practicability, the often quoted cases of France and New York. "Five years ago the enactment of a code was held out to our expectations; each year we were said to be at the beginning of the beginning ; three administrations and four sessions of Parliament have promised, undertaken, and dropped the work. Is it not time that we should set about the task in earnest ? I will venture to say that if four or five per- sons of competent qualification were appointed as commissioners they would, in a few months, make an actual commencement, and in a few years present to Parliament a complete code, worthy of our country, simplifying and im- proving our laws on principles fit to be adopted in an enlightened age, and founded on the solid masonry of our ancient legislation. Nor can I doubt that such a work would be sanctioned by Parliament ; not indeed without debate, but without serious delay."

He also urged the amendment in the law of real property. "The re- visers of the State of New York have laboured to introduce simplicity into their amended law of real property. They have with this view proposed that no disposition of real property should extend beyond the lives of two persons living at the time of the creation of the estate, who should live to attain their majority. This provision now forms part of the law of New York. I am not saying we should adopt this provision ; it may act harshly in some instances —it may sweep too widely in others. Lord St. Leonard's, however, whose Handy-Book of Real Property' is a boon to the whole community, has expressed his opinion that a young society ought not to be entangled in the complications of our law of real property. But if so, why should an old society not make an effort to be free from them ?"

2. Punishment and Reformation. He entered very fully into the ques- tion of punishment and reformation, dealing with the schemes of Jebb and Crofton with which our readers are familiar, and stating thus the net pro- duct of our experiments. -" I. When a person charged with a criminal offence is sent to prison before conviction for safe custody, it is essential that he should be kept separate and not turned loose into a company of no- torious offenders, to corrupt and be corrupted. 2. That after conviction the criminal should be confined separately for a limited time in such a manner that solitude, enforced sobriety, and the exercise of industry as his sole re- source against weariness, may prepare him for a better course of life. It would be unwise to transfer him at once in his subdued state to a condition of freedom, when his very want of energy would probably lead him back to crime. 3. After separate imprisonment the convicts in England and Ireland have with the best effect been removed to prisons where each has a separate cell for sleeping, but where the work is in common. 4. The board of directors in Ireland have introduced a plan of intermediate prisons where the best conducted prisoners are relieved from military or police guards. The con- victs have, however, their appointed work, and their rations and their gra- tuities. At this period they are allowed to obtain by inquiry promises of employment on their discharge. When these promises are ascertained to be trustworthy the prisoner is set free, but for the unexpired period of his sen- tence he remains under the supervision of the police. 5. The passage from one class to another and the distribution of gratuities is regulated by the number of marks obtained for good behaviour." What should be done with the incorrigible ? "Admitting that this is a problem of great difficulty, that difficulty is much lessened when the whole body has been so sifted that the portion of husk and refuse remaining is comparatively small. Would it be too much to say in reference to persons whom the law fifty years ago condemned to the loss of their lives, that those lives should be spent in public labour, and that no period should be as- signed for the remission of their punishment? This portion would, of course, consist of only the irreclaimable few, but while the punishment would reach few, the fear would extend to all." His next topic was reformation. Describing the legislative and volun- tary exertions that have been made, he expressed a strong approval of the reformatory system and closed the subject with this remark. "Everyone must have observed the new influence which is not being asserted or sought, ;Luis falling to the lot of women in swaying the destinies of the world.

is not a share in directing the patronage of Ministers, or guiding the councils of Kings, as in former times, but a portion in the formation and the moulding of public opinion. For a great part of our periodical litera- ture, for much of that world of fiction in which many live, and nearly all and delight, we are indebted to the ethereal fancy, the delicate perception, co dfithe grace of expression possessed by woman. It seems to me, and I am _ n need in this opinion by the bright examples of heroic benevolence we nblaeveetseen of late years, that if the young generation are to be an improve-

upon their fathers, if sin is to have less dominion and religion more Power,

if vice is to be abashed and virtue to be honoured it is to woman tha.,t iv,..ae e.must. look for such a regeneration." 44, quon. Under this head he glanced at the most recent proceed- 2:64) amt then expressed this opinion—" Opinion is still in the gristle upon this subject. For my own part, I confese that, anxious as I am for the pro- gress ofeducation, I am quite willing to TellOWICe any desire to establish in this country the system of France, Austria, or 'Prussia. The freedom of

choice in our modes of popular instruction, the noble fountains of literature, sacred and secular, which are open to the youth thirsting for knowledge, the power to range over the writings of Bacon and Shakspere, and Milton, and Addison, seem to me to make our national education, imperfect and incomplete as it is, still far superior to those continental models."

4. Public Health. The noble speaker illustrated the present conditio& of the public health by copious figures, and said the urgent question to be solved was this : " In Englund and Wales, the town population is increas- ing much more rapidly. I suppose every one will agree that the tide of population cannot be checked or diverted from its channel. Yet we cannot deny the importance of the question, which is becoming every day graver, how is the health of the nation to be sustained in the midst of the new dan- gers which millions of its people are encountering ?" Admitting that the answer is not satisfactory, he yet showed from well-known eases, the cholera at Tynemouth and the water of London, that vigilance in science has been rewarded by baffling and preventing disease. " Undue prejudice and false economy have long delayed the adoption of the remedies prescribed; these are—good supply of air and water, cleanliness, prohibition of overcrowding, removal of noxious matter from the streets and houses. Public taxes, which interfered with these objects ; the tax on windows, the taxes on coals, on candles, and on soap, have of late years been reinoved. Heavy, indeed, will be the responsibility of those who, having the power to procure for themselves and their children the conditions of health and strength in place of those of disease and death refuse or hesitate to adopt the remedies withia their reach. I have spoken of the different rates of mortality in town or country. But this is of a part, and not the stron,gest part, of the case. Feebleness, chronic disease, want of energy, mental and physical, reduce the tone, and I may say disperse the moral character of our town population. The excitement of drains, the stupor of intoxication, are sought as a relief from the low spirits engendered in an unhealthy atmosphere. Hence quar- relling, strife, assaults, poverty, and neglect of education for the offspring of this degenerate race.'' 5. Social Economy. Lord John recommended to the notice of the Asso- ciation the question of emigration, with the view of discovering the condi- tions on. which it can be successfully conducted.

His peroration was rather remarkable. It bore on the objects of the Association and the mission of its members.

" To mankind is allotted labour as its portion, and perpetual inheritance. If any man think that he has nothing to do but to eat, drink, and be merry, in that very night as fearful a doom may fall upon him as did upon the tyrant of old. If any suppose, like the masters of the Roman empire, that the sword has done its work, and that nothing remains for them but luxu- rious enjoyment, that very luxury may revenge the conquered world. If any imagine that to them belongs dominion, and that they may indulge in contempt of the unlettered and ill-fed multitude, that very multitude may overwhelm them in bloody and merciless retribution. It is for us to work as truly as the man who forges the iron bar, or the woman who works at the factory loom. It is for us to endeavour to improve the laws by which the community is governed. It is for us to show how education may be ex- tended and diffused. It is for us to examine and record what has been done for the reformation and punishment of offenders. It is for us to con- firm and animate the efforts which are being made to sustain the public health, and thereby preserve for this country her eminence as the home of a vigorous and independent race. It is for us to investigate the conditions of the great problems of political economy which may often admit of excep- tions, but never of refutations. In so doing we shell but consult the wel- fare of the present awl future generations; in so doing we shall follow the path traced out for us by Almighty benevolence and Almighty wisdom."

Lord John Russell's oration was frequently applauded. The business of the meeting then proceeded ; and afterwards came an exchange of compliments. Thanks were voted to Lord Brougham—" for his services as founder and first president of the association.' The mover was Lord Shaftesbury, the seconder Sir John Pakington. Lord Brougham in re- ply praised Lord John Russell. Then Lord Carlisle moved and Sir J. K. Shuttleworth seconded a vote of thanks to Lord John Russell. Lord John returned the compliments with interest, and then said-

" I may observe, that there are some persons who seem to be nervously alarmed at the attention which is paid to the subject of social science, be- cause, they argue, that persons will get saran away with by all these fa- vourite objects of public life--of sanitary improvements, of reformatories, of prison discipline—that they will really have no time to attend to the po- litics of the country—(laughter)—those questions upon which Sir John Pakington and myself meet in the House of Commons, and upon which we so often have the misfortune to differ. (Lairgh ter.) Now, I really think that that apprehension is very needless, because, much as we may like these subjects, there is so much of excitement in a good parliamentary de- bate—a deal of sarcasm, and indignation and eloquence are thrown from one side to the other—and these matters, indignation, tire so much more interest- ing, and they are so much easier to investigate—[Lord Brougham : "And abuse is so much pleasanter than praise."] (Lagoh ter.) My noble friend says abuse is so much pleasanter than praise, and that reminds ins of an ob- servation of a man who certainly was no excessive lover of his kind—I mean Dean Swift—who said that a panegyric he always found had a good deal of poppy in it—(laughkr)—and that certainly is the case. Therefore I think we may really depend upon it that whatever attention we may pay to these subjects, we shall find, when in the House of Commons, that we shall be quite as warm as ever with regard to our political differences." Early the next morning a large audience assembled to hear Lord Brougham lecture upon "Popular Literature." This theme he treated with great breadth and his usual eloquence. He showed first how the day had gone by when the diffusion of knowledge among the humbler classes was regarded as dangerous, and entered at length into the trans- actions of the Useful Knowledge Society to prove how successful were its exertions imi cheapening the price of books, maps, and prints ; es- pecially dwelling on the influence of the Pi nn y Magazine, that happy suggestion of Mr. M. D. Hill. Then he described its successors, which have improved upon the original by introducing "storice," noticing their great circulation—twice as large as that of the Penny Maya:inc. He devoted a great space to show that a little knowledge is not a dan- gerous thing. "'Better half a loaf than no bread,' is the old English saying. Alt wrong,' say the objectors, a little food is a dangerous thing ; rather starve

than not have your till." Better be purblind than stone blind,' is the French saying. ' cry the objectors, if you can't see quite clearly, what use is there in seeing at all ? ' In the country of the blind, says the proverb, the one-eyed man is king ; our objectors belonging to the people there would dethrone the monarch by putting out his eye. But they had better couch their blind brethren to restore their sight, and then his reign

would cease at once without any act of violence any coup dV.'al. Here is a well of precious water, and we have got a little of it in a tankard. What

signifies, say the objectors, such a paltry supply ? It would not wet the lips of half-a.-dozen of the hundreds who are atlurst. True, but it enables us to wet the sucker of the pump, instead of following their advice to leave it dry ; and having the handle, we use it to empty the well, and satisfy all. A person gains some information—it may be only a little. Say the objector!, he is superficial. Would he be more profound if he knew nothing ? The twi- light is unsafe for his steps. Would he be more secure from slipping in the dark."

He showed that the popular literature helps alike those who read for profit and those who read for amusement; giving the former cheap means of pro- gress, and leading the latter on by exciting their curiosity. " So great and varied are the helps afforded to students in humble life, that it has been said that there can be no such thing now as a self-taught person. Let us only reflect how mighty would have been the comfort to such students in former times could they have enjoyed such facilities. What would Franklin have given for them, who, living on a vegetable diet on purpose to save a few pence from his day's wages for the purchase of books, was fain to learn a little geometry from a treatise on navigation, he had been happy enough to pick up at a book-stall, something of arithmetic by having fallen upon a copy of Cocker, and from an old volume of the Spectator gained a notion of the style he afterwards so powerfully used ? What would Simpson have given for access to books, who could only get, from the accident of a pedlar passing the place where he was kept by his father working. at his trade of a weaver, the copy of Cocker containing a little algebra ; and even when grown up could only, by borrowing Stone's translation of L'Hopital ' from a friend, obtain an insight into the science of infinitesimals, on which, two years after, he published an admirable work while continuing to divide his time between his toil as a weaver and as a teacher ? Brindle.y, the great engineer, was through life an uneducated man; Rannequin is said never to have learned the alphabet ; and both exe- cuted great works, but with difficulties and delays which reading would have spared them. Harrison, too, though he had received an ordinary edu- cation, yet only while working in his trade of a carpenter became ac- quainted with science by some manuscript lectures of Saunderson falling in his way ; and so hard did he find it to obtain adequate knowledge on the subjects connected with his mechanical pursuits, that forty years were spent in perfecting his admirable improvements on the construction of time- keepers and bringing them into use. It would be going too far to hold that Franklin's genius, both in physical and political science, could have done greater things had his original difficulties in self-education been removed ; but we may safely affirm that both Brindley, Rannequin, and Harrison would have effected far more with the helps which their successors have had ; and of Simpson no doubt can be entertained, that even amidst the distractions of his trade, his short life would have been illustrated by far greater steps in mathematical science." Nothing can be more unreflecting than to doubt the beneficial tendency of "Popular Litera- ture." "When Mr. Hill proposed the Penny Magazine,' the first of the kind now so happily established in the confidence of the people, Mr. C. Knight brought him a list of no less than nine weekly papers devoted to the circulation of the most abominable matter ; morally : scandalous and ob- scene; religiously : not simply infidel, but scoffing and ribald ; politically : preaching anarchy, hardly even confined to the crazy dreams of socialism ; but, as if the editor were that boy become a man, who, when the Sovereign went to meet his Parliament, had been arrested for bawling out, 'No King, no Church, no Lords, no Commons, no nothing '—(laughter)—the Penny Magazine' drove the vile publications actually out of existence. A most feeble progeny alone was left to succeed them ; it skulked in corners, and ever since has scarcely been heard of. It was like the effect of the society's almanack, which put an end to the disreputable fortune-telling tracts before published by the Stationers' Company, and abandoned by them, other and rational year books being substituted in their place, perhaps immediately. Certainly as soon as the illustrious statesman and war- rior at the head of the Government, without any application on our part, gave directions that the Society's ahnanack should be used at all the offices. But it is not only irreligious and immoral and fraudu- lent publications that have been supplanted; and far less hurtful, yet by no means commendable works, which study to give the mere excitement of horror, by dealing in accounts of brutal murder and cruel seductions, and in romances abounding in such descriptions, together with ghost stories. These, once so greedily pored over, now find but little acceptation, and have ceased to be in demand. It is most satisfactory to find that the natural preference of the people is for the better kind of writings. At times of poli- tical or religious excitement, those of a worse cast may have some success, but it is temporary. The works of Carlisle and Paine have long ceased to attract readers, the people falling back upon papers which combine harmless recreation with some instruction ; and the tendency of public prosecution to give them any interest which they had not naturally was found so manifest that the Government has long taken the safer course of letting them alone." He showed that it is contrary to the fact to say that the stories in which the working classes delight relate to scenes in high life. They delight most in stories illustrative of their own life ; because the fiction of today may be the reality of tomorrow. Nor has the improved literature supplanted more solid works ; it has only provided food for those who had none before. "It is quite as great a delusion under which those labour who figure to themselves the pro- moters of popular literature as indifferent to the encouragement of more se- vere studies, and the cultivation of profounder science. We, of the Useful Knowledge Society, can well recollect that exactly the same prejudice pre- vailed, or, if it did not, was sought to be raised against its preparation of scientific works in a cheap form, and designed to give information of the most solid and even profound description. Some of the very persons who were remunerated, and amply remunerated, for their writings, derided what they called sixpenny science,' because a treatise once a fortnight for several years was published at that price ; but by whom composed ? By such mathe- maticians asProfessor de Morgan, such natural philosophers as Sir D. Brews- ter, a discourser as well as a teacher, and such botanists as Professor Lindley. It was plain enough that some of those who thus complained of the treatises as not profound could not have read one line of them, from their own profound ignorance of these subjects. Contemporary with the Penny Magazine' was the ' Penny Cyclopedia,' of which it is enough to say that so accomplished a scholar as Professor Long being the conductor, no less a mathematician than the Astronomer Royal has published in a separate form his valuable contributions to the work ; papers, too, composed in so plain and popular a manner as to bring the most sublime truths of the Newtonian philosophy within the comprehension of readers very moderately acquainted with mathematics. At the bottom of the clamour against the Useful Knowledge Society's proceedings, possibly not unconnected with the present attacks upon popular literature, was the notion that the gains of authors are lessened, the wages of literary labour reduced, an error not less glaring than that of the common workman who should object to the capital by which his labour is employed and paid being invested at low profits and quick returns. Indeed, the fund out of which literary labour is paid has been very greatly increased by the cheap publications. Independent of the

Cyclopedia,' the Society did not expend leas than 100,000/. in this way, the whole of which arose from the profits of its cheap works, which, by their charter of incorporation, they were bound thus to expend."

Lord Brougham showed the evil effects of the paper duty, but suggested that the working classes should meet the difficulty by drinking less of in- toxicating liquors. He enlarged on the benefits of the newspapers, but he does not seem to wish for more of them. " It has been contended that on newspaper press, by the paper duty and other circumstances, is hampesedt so as to make the supply fall short of actual demand. This may be doubted, But it is further said that the demand ought to be greater, and the examplee' of the United States is cited, where the number of journals is very niti larger in proportion to the number of the people—where, indeed, a newspapee is reckoned so much an article of first necessity, that no sooner is a spot the forest cleared for a village, than a printing press is sent for. The polot. cal situation of America is probably the cause of this. The nature of the Government throws the whole country into a never-ceasing state of e agitation, there being no office from the highest to the lowest, from Pee% 71 dent to penny postman, which may not be changed at each renewal of that high functionary's term ; and thus the whole period of his incumbency is passed in canvass and cabal. There seems every reason to think that oath us there is already an abundant supply of the article in question • that even Paley would have been of this opinion ; that he would have been' suspicious of any scheme which tended to deteriorate its quality ; that above all, what- ever objection he might have made, and most justly, to the tax, he would have received with entire reprobation any proposal of reducing its price by a piracy upon literary property." After this business began. In each department, the readingofpapetbse was preceded by addresses from the president. In the Educational de- partment, Mr. Cowper presided. He complained that the subject of education has not been submitted to scientific investigation, and looked to the Royal Commission to furnish facts on which reliance con be placed. He found fault with the whole state of education. Speak. ing of the poor, he said- ' The children of the labouring classes see very little of school after the age of ten. Their habits are so migratory that only 34 per cent are found in the same school for more than two years ; and of 2,262,000 children betwe,en the ages of three and fifteen who are not at school, 1,800,000 are absent with- out any necessity or justification. Some learn nothing, and more forget entire. ly all they have learned. The early impressions fade away, leaving little traces upon their minds for want of renewal. Coming to the remedy for this state of things, the right honourable gentleman said that the first impulse was to turn to the seat of authority. In France children remained at school until 13 and 14 ; yet 850,000 grew no without education. From the Baltic to the Adriatic the schooling received was six or eight years ; and yet the lower classes were not very differently circumstanced from our own. England was the only civilized country without a national system of educa- tion ; but we had no conscription, passports, or Minister of Police. Parents here were assisted by the State, the Church, and individuals. On the Continent the State only had schools; here individuals and the Church. In Germany education became a necessity consequent upon the Reformation, and Luther's argument was that the State should train moral as well as fighting soldiers. Russian schools were national establishments, provided out of local rates, and parents of absentees between six and fourteen were fined and imnrisoned The chief cause of the absence of chil- dren from sclools is the early commencement of labour, and I am not sanguine enough to expect that this hindrance will ever be removed. The child is anxious to assume as early as possible the independent position of an earner of bread ; and no doubt the early acquisition of habits of industry and of special aptitude has tended to make the English workman what he is—the best workman in the world. But if study cannot be substituted for work, it may be combined with it. The combination of head-work with hand-work is favourable to both, as is proved by the factory and the industrial schools. Wherever children are

i

working n numbers under circumstances that call for the intervention of the law, opportunitiesjor education should be secured- for instance, chil- dren between ten and'Iourteen in mines might easily have secured to them the same amount of instruction as those in print-works—viz., 150 hours in the half-year. If the education of the children cannot be continued longer, it may be commenced earlier, by the improvement of infant schools; and though I feel there is in theory a forcible objection to those schools, on ac- count of the removal of the infant from the mother's care, yet in practice mothers who are busy with household cares are utterly unable to give their infants the training they require' or to prepare them for the regular school ; and I am sure that infant schools are a necessity of our present position." Having referred to the sixty art-schools now established, he said—" The middle-class schools have sprung into a new arena. They have done wisely. to .turn to the ancient universities which are proving that though ancient they are not antiquated and 'though refined, not too fastidious to lend a guiding hand to the 'business classes. ("Hear, lacer!") I trust they will spare more time for instruction in the Eng- lish language. It is curious how slow all our schools have been in attending to that which ought to be the characteristic of all educated men—correct grammar and orthography, and a clear and simple style. Why should not such authors as Milton, Shakespeare, and Jeremy Taylor be studied with as much care as the great writers of ancient times ? When I was a boy I passed through Eton without may attention being called in the slightest degree to a line in any English book; but now I am happy to see that Professorships of English are being established in many educational institutions, and 1 know that at King's College, in London, the Professor of English Literature has been struck by the remarkable powers of writing that have been developed among his pupils by the study of composition and style." In the department of Punishment and Reformation, the Earl of Car- lisle went over ground, and used facts very familiar to our readers. The following excerpt, however, contains some new information drawn from experience- " The remaining school to which I have referred is nestled among my own meads at Castle Howard, and I can say with truth that I regard it as one of the chief attractions of a place not deficient in its adornments. The main cause of the success which the institution has hitherto obtained—for it must be remembered that, with respect to all of them, we are as yet speaking only by the light of very early experience—as well as of its specie' attraction for myself, is undoubtedly to be found in the character and quali- ties of the superintendent chaplain, Mr. Fish. I have already borne my testimony to the merits of Mr. Organ, and I should wish to dwell for a mo- ment on those which exhibit a large amount both of correspondence and of contrast with them. The distinguished president of the first provincial meeting of the National Reformatory Union, held at Bristol in 1856, (Lord Stanley), put the case of 100 criminal children thus : Born of dishonest pa- rents, 60; born of profligate parents, 30; born of honest and industrious parents, 10. The Castle Howard Reformatory statistics nearly confirm these proportions. Sixty-four have passed through the school, 3and; board

re now inmates. Of these the are : Born of dishonest parents, 0

of profligate parents, 22; born of honest and industrious peen 12. I will adduce one local illustration which, I think, throws con- siderable light upon more than one branch of reformatory inquiry: It shall be that of the very first they committed to the Castle Howard. School. He had been a worker in a cotton-mill, the foreman..vd_ which apparently discovered special aptitudes in him extending hoydnd.n.! work, so he kept him when the other hands were dismissed, and taught nil to pick pockets. For two years our boy Tom regularly picked pockets o the pier of Hull, and at the High Church, giving the proceeds to his in- structor. In return he was comfortably lodged and fed, and often taken to , He remembers instances of robbery from the person, the ag- gregate tatre proceeds of which exceeded 2001., all of which were perpetrated be. tore was convicted at all. When once he had been caught, convictions followed in rapid succession until they had reached seven, at which point the Castle Howard School was opened in his person. After the treatment of two years, partly there and partly at Calder Farm, he is now pursuing an in

d strious and honest career. From this short narrative I would deduce . .

the following points :—The exposure of young children to corrupting in- fluences ; the great expensiveness of even the most youthful crime, as evi- denced both in the amount of undetected plunder and the cost of repeated preseeUtiOflS and convictions ; and most important of all, the hopefulness of the reformatory process, which I should have felt myself less emboldened by this single instance to lay stress upon, if I had not the authority of the superintendent for stating that the large majority of cases already completed, of which he has been cognizant, have been equally satisfactory. I am aware that many of the farmers in my neighbourhood are not only willing to avail themselves of the labour of the boys while they are still inmates of their school, but are ever anxious to take them into permanent service upon their discharge. There have been some very pleasing instances of boys making re- stitution after their discharge to persons whom they had previously robbed. The chaplain of the gaol at Hull writes,—' The effect of the reformatory movement on the juvenile criminals of Hull has, I think, been of the most beneficial character ; some weeks ago we had not a single boy in gaol.' I believe that similar satisfactory testimony can be given from other districts, but I have deemed it best to confine myself to my own."

The Earl of Shaftesbury-, as President of the Public Health section, delivered one of those speeches which he has been accustomed to make "in another place," showing the evil effects of overcrowded dwellings, foul air, and scarcity of water. He made an eloquent appeal on behalf of the poor. "Go and look into the records of overcrowded dwellings. Look into the effects of drains, of ill-drained close alleys, of the pestilential localities which fill our hospitals with fever and our workhouses with paupers ; and then bear in mind the great fact that I hope will now be examined into—that crime is now ascertained to be no longer dependant upon poverty or high wages, but is invariably found to be most fertile, most abundant, and most constant among ill-drained localities and among closely-crowded houses, and in all places where neglect and overcrowding squalor keep festering together. Look also to your common lodginghouses. In many places they still retain all their normal evils. Look upon them as hotbeds of vice, as hotbeds of pestilence, and take care that in your survey of the different towns these buildings do not escape your observation. Again, look to the effect of overtoil of all kinds upon the young and upon the old. I do not say that toil is not the portion of the human race, nor that a great deal of toil which has been regarded as unwholesome must not still be the portion of many in our complicated state of society. But when you see these evils and regard them as in some re- spects necessary-, direct your attention to ascertain whether they cannot be mitigated. Then, again, look at the total want, in many instances, of a wholesome water-supply in the midst of our dense localities, but find no fault with the wretched people who are the victims of that neglect. If you go among them and find them covered with dirt, so that you cannot distinguish their nakedness from the miserable rags which cover them; if you find them covered with vermin—and I must say I have gone ameng them with my friends, and have returned with a considerable household of vermin upon any back—if you go and see these things, do not lay the blame upon them, but lay the blame upon yourselves. You have knowledge, you have the means • they have not the knowledge, they have not the means ; and by everything true, by everything holy, you—you are your brother's keeper. Again, turn your attention to all those deleterious articles of food; turn your attention to the sale of poisons, and to rotten food, and to all those evil things which take place in the midst of dense populations. In places where vigilance is not exercised you may find food sold to the poor so poisonous in itself that it is alone sufficient to breed a pestilence. Can you wonder, then—can you be astonished at the moral evils that flow from them ? Go among those people ; hear with your own ears and see with your own eyes what I now state—the utter corruption of language, of thought, of practice in all those districts. I am not speaking in condemna- tion of those people ; for the circumstances in which they are are such that these things come upon them almost by inevitable necessity. I will not dare to speak of many things that cannot be mentioned in any mixed as- sembly; but you may picture to yourselves what must be the consequences of overcrowded dwellings. Where two, three, or four families are living in a crowded house, or in a room where the sexes are blended, can you wonder at any amount of sin, can you wonder at any amount of vice, can you wonder at anything which we cannot mention in this mixed assembly occurring ? If you do wonder, go and inquire for yourselves, and your wonder will cease ; for there you will find it clear, unmistakable as any proposition in Euclid."

In the department of Social Economy—including all branches of social science not included in the other departments, Sir James Stephen, pre- sident, set himself to tell his hearers; why and how we colonize, and why and how we emigrate. He delivered an instructive discourse vin- dicating the usefulness of colonization and emigration against Sir George Lewis and Archbishop Whately. The following passage describes in few words some of the progress made.

"It is said by Archbishop Whately that we have lost the Art of coloni- zation. A melancholy, if indeed it be an accurate statement. For since the peace of 1815 we have sent from our shores more than five millions of emigrants, of whom about two millions have reached Australia and Canada ; and these, if the Archbishop be right, must have become not well settled colonists, but so many aimless vagabonds. Now, he himself (as I have heard him say) is exactly of the same age as the oldest of our Australian colonies. In his lifetime these territories were a mere hunting-ground, where hordes of naked savages chased herds of leaping kangaroos ; and in his lifetime they are the abode of more than 1,000,000 of persons of British birth or parentage. In his lifetime these territories were covered by the prinamval forest; and, in his lifetime, they are now the seat of eight repre- sentative Legislatures, of as many superior courts of justice, of ten bishop- rics, of four universities, of churches, chapels, and schools counted by the hundred, of miles of road and railway counted by the' thousand, and of seaportsthronged with shipping beyond all but British or American ex- ample. Or to select one from these eight colonies. It is just twenty-one 3_,esears ago that I had to lay before Lord Glenelg, then my official supenor, a d patch from New South Wales, announcing the arrival at the southern cape of that colony of a small body of English adventurers, who seemed dis- Posed to settle on that nameles and uninhabited region. It has now acquired the name of Victoria. It is nov7 inhabited by half-a-million of free men. It has now a capital city as large and as populous as Oxford. It has an an- nual revenue of nearly 4,000,000/. It annually exports goods to the value of 12,000,0001.,

a against imports of the value of 11,000,000/. Or back from Victori to the antipodean province of Canada. Wheff Dr. Whately entered

this world there were not nearly 100,000 Canadians on it. Now there are more than 2,000,000, and they the constituents of a Legislature unrivalled in dignity or power by any Legislature on earth, except the Parliament of this kingdom and the Congress of the United States. 'Therefore, I hold that the great commentator on Lord Bacon's Essay on Colonization is in error ; that it is an art which this age has not lost, but has discovered ; and that though it be an age of great marvels, it has produced nothing more truly marvellous than the recent growth of our colonial empire."

Some interesting papers have been read, a few of the titles of which we can only specify : Mr. Horace Mann and the Reverend J. S. How- son, on Competitive Examination ; Mr. Ruskin on Education in Art; the Reverend Charles Kingsley on the influence of our elective system on Sanitary Improvement ; Mr. Nightingale on the Health of Hospitals ; Mr. J. Damson on Statistics ; Dr. Farr on the Influence of Marriage on the Morality of the French people. A large number of papers on crime and punishment; and on law. There have been real active discussions, too, in the several departments.