POOR LAW.

Annual Report of the Commissioners for Administering the Laws for Relief of the Poor in Ireland.

In the year ended 29th September, 1861, the amount of poor rate lodged was 584,548., and the amount expended, 516,7697., against 454,531l. in 1860; the number relieved having been 203,422 in-door, and 14,008 outdoor, against 170,549 in-door, and 8965 out-door in 1860.

Pauperism and expenditure in relief declined in a very rapid manner from the year 1850-51, down to the year 1858-59, but in the two succeeding years there was an increase in the average daily pauperism from 41,676 to 48,672, and in the annual relief expenditure from 413,7127. to 516,7691., or 16.8 per cent. in the numbers relieved, and 24.9 per cent. in the expenditure.

In the year ended 29th September, 1859, a less degree of pauperism and a smaller relief expenditure were presented than in any year since the completion of all the workhouses and the full introduction of the poor law. The average daily number relieved in the workhouse in that year was 40,380 persons, and out of the workhouse, 1296; and the total relief expenditure, 413,712. The average weekly cost of maintenance, exclusive of clothing, in the workhouses was 1s. 11d., which, taken in comparison with 28. 2d. in 1860, 2s. 44d. in 1861, and 2s. 3 d. the present weekly cost in 1862, shows the price of the provisions consumed by the poorer classes in Ireland to have been relatively low in 1859.

The year ended 29th September, 1860, was one of considerably increased expenditure through an increase chiefly of the cost of provisions, and, therefore, of the cost of maintenance; the average daily number of in-door paupers (41,271), not materially exceeding that of 1858-59, viz., 40,380, although the relief expenditure rose from 413,7127. to 454,5317.; and the average daily number on out-door relief having increased only from 1296 to 2001.

The commencement of 1860 was marked by a great dearth of fodder and loss of cattle in many districts of the west and south of Ireland, and may be looked at as the beginning of that state of pecuniary difficulty in which the small farmers of those districts became involved, and which has been aggravated by the unfavourable character of the two succeeding harvests.

The year ended 29th September, 1861, showed a further considerable increase both of pauperism and expenditure. In the autumn of 1860 there was a great blight of the potato, and the price of the necessaries of life became higher in 1860-61 than in any year since the famine period. The cost of maintenance in the work house, exclusive of clothing, rose in the course of this year from 28. 21d. to 2s. 5d. week. The average head per daily number of workhouse inmates increased to 45,136; and the relief expenditure to 516,7697., an increase of 62,238l. in comparison with that of the preceding year.

per

Of the year which will end 29th September, 1862, nearly six months have now passed, including what is known by long experience to be the worst part of the year. This period of twenty-five weeks has been marked, on the one hand, by a much greater failure of the potato crop than the corresponding part of 1860-61, and by a great scarcity and dearth of fuel. On the other hand, the price of food has been lower throughout than last

year, the cost of workhouse maintenance, a sure and universal index, having fallen from 2s. 5d. to 2s. 3 d.

It is sometimes urged that the degree of distress existing in Ireland is not to be ascertained from the returns of pauperism, as in a large proportion of the unions out-door relief is not afforded, and in the remainder the number so relieved is relatively very small. Under these circumstances it would certainly not be right to judge of the degree of distress generally existing in Ireland from the number receiving out-door relief. But the degree of distress, however, prevailing in Ireland at any time, we believe to be accurately indicated by the number receiving relief in the workhouses. Relief in the workhouse is freely granted, because it is known by experience to be asked for those only who are in need of it; and when the necessity for it has ceased the recipients voluntarily discharge themselves and cease to receive relief. The consequence is, that a constant change of persons takes place throughout the year in the workhouses, and a great difference in the number at different seasons of each year. If reference be made to the series of weekly summaries given at the commencement of each annual report, it will be seen that for ten years past, the season of greatest pauperism has always been the season of least employment, and of the most general prevalence of sickness-namely, the months of January and February. From the time of the commencement of more genial weather, and the resumption of agricultural employment, the workhouse lists begin to decline, and continue to do so until after the harvest operations have concluded. A gradual increase of the numbers then begins, and continues until the time of the maximum number in the ensuing year.

The time of the maximum number varies very little in different years; the variation, when it does occur, appearing to be influenced by the state of the weather. For example, in 1851-52 the maximum occurred on the 21st February; in 1852-53, on the 19th February; in 1853-54, on the 11th February; in 1854-55, on the 24th February; in 1855-56, on the 16th February; in 1656-57, on the 7th February; in 1857-58, on the 13th March; in 1858-59, on the 12th February; in 1859-60, on the 3rd March; and in 1860-61, on the 23rd March. In the present year it would appear to have occurred on the 8th March.

During the same period of ten years the rise and fall of the numbers on the out-door relief lists has followed for the most part the same law; but not with so much exactness, because the number receiving out-relief in Ireland is dependent more on the views of boards of guardians as to the safety and expediency of affording it, than on the number of the applicants, or the pressure of distress.

We are now witnessing a change occurring in a series of years, in consequence of a reverse which has taken place in the circumstances of a part of the population; and just as the state of the relief lists indicates the relative degree of pressure of distress at different seasons of the year, so it also indicates the difference in that respect between one year and another. It is true, that for the most part, and excepting cases of sickness, it is only destitution that is relieved, and that at all times there is much distress in a class above pauperism, which is unrelieved by the poor law. It may be assumed, however, that such unrelieved distress is in a constant ratio to the amount of destitution exhibited on the relief lists; inasmuch as the causes which create destitution in the one class are usually identical with the causes which create distress in the other.

The progress, therefore, not only of destitution but of distress in the last three years, may be gathered from the workhouse relief lists, which, at the present date, exhibit an increase since the spring of 1859 of about 36 per cent.

This increase, although a very serious one, does not appear to justify the alarm expressed in some quarters, that a famine analogous to that of 1846-47 is impending; and that the time of its greatest development will be in summer, the distress increasing in the meantime until it is arrested by the season of the potato harvest and corn harvest. So far from such being likely to be the case, it is our present belief, founded on the experience of past years, on the known abundance and comparative cheapness of food at this time, and on the good sanitary state of the population at large, that the time of greatest distress in this year is already past, and that a progressive improvement has already begun and will steadily go on until the time of the year (September) when the decrease of pauperisin usually ends, and an increase again commences.

It is possible, however, that some disturbance of the ordinary law of increase and decrease may occur from the fact, that in some parts of Ireland the causes of distress have been cumulative for two or three years, tending to an exhaustion of resources, and that in other districts trade is suffering much from the continuance of the civil war in America; which latter circumstance not only presses on some of the town populations in Ireland, but causes many Irish, who are thrown out of employment in Great Britain, to return and swell the numbers of the destitute in their native country. It appears that after Connaught the province of Ulster has suffered next in degree, and that the county of Armagh, the seat of an extensive linen manufacture by hand-loom, shows the largest percentage of increased pauperism in Ireland, amounting to no less than 45 per cent.

Up to the present time the compulsory removal of Irish-born subjects from England to Ireland has not been so frequent as might have been expected from the collapse of trade in the English cotton districts.

The recent change in the law of removal from England to Ireland may have had some influence in checking the practice of deportation. The state of that law, however, and the way in which it is administered in England, remain in our opinion unsatisfactory. The total number of removal orders known to have been executed since the passing, in August last, of the Act 24 & 25 Vict. c. 76, is 140, comprising 278 persons.

In the autumn of 1860, when the potato blight was producing some alarm, we thought it desirable to prepare for a possible augmention of the numbers in the workhouses by revising what are called the Limitation Orders, issued during the famine period to the several unions in Ireland, limiting the number of persons to be accommodated in each workhouse at one and the same time. Since the issue of many of those orders, changes in the extent and arrangement of the available buildings had occurred; and we were anxious, moreover, to take the utmost precaution practicable against the possibility of overcrowding, hereafter, any part of a workhouse. We, therefore, set on foot a new measurement and new appropriation of the space in the workhouses and placed the authorized total number to be received into each workhouse under new sealed orders. We, at the same time, caused the guardians to have the number authorized for each dormitory affixed, in legible characters, on the entrance door of each. These operations have since been completed throughout Ireland, and have

resulted in a reduction of the supposed available accommodation in workhouses from 186,917 to 146,927.

Although, at the present time, the aggregate available accommodation in workhouses is, as before stated, 146,927, and the number of inmates 60,447, leaving space on the whole for 86,480, some of the workhouses in the larger unions, especially South Dublin, Cork, and Limerick, have been pressed upon by applicants for relief so as nearly to fill all the vacant space.

We have not, however, up to the present time issued any order under the 2nd section of 10th Vict., cap. 31, authorizing out-door relief, in food, to able-bodied persons, nor do we now expect to be called upon to do so; a diminution of the number of inmates being generally in progress.

The proceedings under the Medical Charities Act show a distribution. in the year ended 30th September, 1861, of 627,322 dispensary tickets, and 167,447 visiting tickets: total, 794,769, against 761,633 in the previous year. The expenditure for medical charities was 104,681l. in 1861, against 104,247. in 1860.

MARRIAGES, BIRTHS, AND DEATHS.

Table of the Number of Marriages, Births, and Deaths, registered in England in the Year 1862.

WITH a population in 1861 of 20,066,224, there were 163,991 marriages, or 327,982 persons married; 711,691 births; and 436,514 deaths. The births included 363,241 males and 348,450 females; and the deaths 222,942 males, and 213,572 females. The marriages were registered in the following proportions: 33,976 in the quarter ending the last day of March, 40,771 in the quarter ending June, 40,586 in the quarter ending September, and 48,659 in the quarter ending December. The births were registered as follows: 182,005 in the quarter ending March, 185,638 in the quarter ending June, 172,237 in the quarter ending September, and 171,811 in the quarter ending December. The deaths were registered as follow: 122,197 in the quarter ending March, 107,555 in the quarter ending June, 92,225 in the quarter ending September, and 114,542 in the quarter ending December. In the London division, in a population of 2,803,989, there were 28,838 marriages, 97,418 births, and 66,950 deaths, In the South-Eastern, in a population of 1,847,661, there were 13,775 marriages, 59,293 births, and 33,944 deaths. In the South Midland, in population of 1,295,497, there were 8760 marriages, 43,186 births, and 24,980 deaths. In the Eastern, in a population of 1,142,580, there were 7651 marriages, 37,268 births, and 22,097 deaths. In the South-Western, in a population of 1,835,714, there was 13,772 marriages, 59,616 births, and 34,469 deaths. In the West Midland, in a population of 2,436,568, there were 19,907 marriages, 89,001 births, and 52,164 deaths. In the North Midland, in a population of 1,288,928, there were 9610 marriages, 45,149 births, and 25,341 deaths. In the North-Western, in a population of 2,935,540, there were 24,862 marriages, 114,466 births, and 75,115 deaths. In the York division, in a population of 2,015,541, there were 17,266 marriages, 75,930 births, 47,517 deaths. In the Northern, in a population of 1,151,372, there were 9757 marriages, 45,451 births, and 26,366 deaths. And in the Welsh, in a population of 1,312,834, there were 9795 marriages, 44,913 births, and 27,571 deaths.

PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.

Report from the Select Committee on Parliamentary Proceedings.

ON the 1st April, 1862, a committee of the House of Commons was appointed to consider whether it is practicable and expedient to provide a compendious record of parliamentary proceedings for the use of members. The committee was nominated on the 10th, and it consisted of Mr. Edward Pleydell Bouverie, Sir George Grey, Mr. Massey, Mr. Sotheron Estcourt, Mr. Walpole, Viscount Enfield, Mr. Henry Herbert, Sir William Heathcote, Colonel Wilson Patten, Mr. Hennessy, Mr. Purcell, Mr. Stansfeld, and Mr. Bright; Mr. Kinnaird and Lord Robert Montague were afterwards added to the committee. The committee examined Mr. Thomas Erskine May, C.B., clerk assistant to the House of Commons, Mr. Toulmin Smith, author of the Parliamentary Remembrancer; Mr. James Bigg, author of several works on parliamentary proceedings; Mr. Charles Rowland, clerk of the Journal; Mr. T. C. Hansard, editor of Hansard's Debates; Dr. Leone Levi, editor of Annals of British Legislation; and Mr. Charles Ross, director of the Times parliamentary reporting corps, and author of the Parliamentary Record. On the 2nd July, the committee reported as follows:

Before considering whether it is practicable and expedient to provide a compendious record of parliamentary proceedings for the use of members, your committee desire to state, briefly, the existing mode of recording the proceedings of the House of Commons, of making that record known, and of facilitating search as to any particular entries contained in it.

The clerk of the House of Commons, or, as he is styled in his patent, "the under clerk of the Parliament, to attend upon the Commons," before he enters upon his office, has to take an oath "to attend upon the Commons of this realm of Great Britain, making true entries, remembrances, and journals of the things done and past in the same."

In discharge of this duty, it is his practice, with the aid of the first and second clerk assistant, to keep two minute books at the table of the House, in which every act, order, and proceeding of the House, and any communication made to it, is recorded.

It should be observed, that the clerk is prohibited from taking notes or making entry of any debate, it having been an ancient resolution of the House," that the entry of the clerk of particular men's speeches was without warrant." The single exception to this prohibition appears to be, when it becomes the duty of the clerk, in certain circumstances, to take down the words of a member to which objection has been made as irregular. No mention, therefore, occurs in the minute book of those questions, unaccompanied by a motion, which now occupy a large portion of the daily notice paper, or of the answers given to such questions.