But by far the greatest number of prisoners consists of those committed to gaol under summary convictions for offences against the game laws, the revenue laws, the Bastardy Act, the Vagrant Act, the Malicious Trespass Act, &c. This will be seen from the following state

ments:

Table showing the Total Number of Male and Female Prisoners, classed according to their Offences, under Summary Convictions in England and Wales during the Five Years ending with 1843.

1,098 2,685 686 3,751 697 9,834 3,056 43,290 14,175 57,455 1,347 2,253 489 4,565 941 10,665 3,492 47,962 16,017 63,979 1,423 2,460 406 4,523 761 9,534 3,317 47.629 15,607 63,296 1,535 2,749 518 4,253 695 10,651 3,952 54.784 15,723 70,507 1,505 3,020 664 3,748 612 11,639 3,986 37,361 15,835 78,196

Table showing the Terms of Imprisonment of the Prisoners under Summary Convictions in England and Wales, in each of the Five Years ending with 1843, with the Proportions per Cent. which the several Classes of Prisoners, when distributed according to the Terms of their Imprisonment, bear to the whole Number of Prisoners.

Number Per Cent.
of of Total

Number Per Cent.
of of Total

of Total

Prisoners. Convicted. Prisoners. Convicted. Prisoners. Convicted. Prisoners. Convicted. Prisoners. Convicted.

Number
of

Per Cent.
of Total

Number
of

Per Cent.

Scotch Prisons.-Down to a comparatively recent period the prisons of Scotland were in an extremely bad state. They have, however, been materially improved since 1826, when their state was inquired into, and the abuses by which they were infected exposed, by a Com

mittee of the House of Commons. At present they are principally conducted under the provisions of an Act passed in 1839, the 2 and 3 Vict., c. 42. This statute established a General Prison Board, which has its seat in Edinburgh: it consists partly of members holding their seats ex officio, and partly of others nominated by the Crown. This Board makes rules, subject to the revision of the Secretary of State for the Home Department, for the government of prisons and prisoners, and makes annual reports of its proceedings. The immediate management and control of all county prisons (excepting that near Perth) is vested in County Boards, chosen in the way pointed out in the Act, and governed in certain particulars by the advice of the General Board. The cost of providing for prisons and prisoners is defrayed by a general rate on property.

A central prison, on a large scale, under the exclusive control of the General Board, is established near Perth; a building formerly used as a depôt for French prisoners having been fitted up for that purpose. Prisoners are sent to this prison from all parts of Scotland. It is conducted on the separate system, which is either introduced, or to be introduced where practicable, into all the gaols in Scotland. The Scotch prisons are regularly inspected by an officer appointed by Government for the purpose.

The Glasgow bridewell is one of the best-managed prisons in the country, according to the present separate system, of which it affords a very favourable specimen. It is one of the "lions" of the town, and is visited almost every day by strangers. The prisoners occupy wellaired, well-lighted, comfortable cells, in which they are employed in their respective trades, and their health is said to be improved rather than injured by their detention. But the result that every man of sense, not under the influence of the merest prejudice, might have anticipated, has taken place. Confinement in the bridewell has, in great measure, ceased to be regarded in the light of a punishment; and crimes are every now and then committed by individuals who have been dismissed from it, that they may get back to their old quarters! It is absurd to call such a place a bridewell or a penitentiary; it acts as an incentive to crime, and not as a means of correcting criminals; and is, in fact, neither more nor less than a public nuisance. And yet we are to have similar edifices opened in every great town in the empire; and the management of the Glasgow bridewell is to be held up as a model for their imitation! We subjoin

I. An Account of the Average Daily Number of Prisoners confined in the Prisons of Scotland during each of the Six Years ending with 1845.

II. An Account showing the Number of Prisoners sentenced to Imprisonment for Six Months and upwards in Scotland, during each of the Six Years ending with 1845, distinguishing between Males and Females, and between the Terms for which they were Sentenced.

Irish Prisons.-The statute 7 Geo. IV., cap. 74, " for the better Regulation of Prisons in Ireland," was framed on the basis of the English Gaol Act. This statute vested a power in the Irish government of appointing two inspectors-general, whose duty it is to visit the prisons of Ireland, to suggest improvements in their construction and regulation, and to report annually to government on their condition. The grand juries of each county and city are also required to appoint a board of superintendence and a local inspector, whose duty it is to visit the prison twice, at least, in every week. Much benefit has been derived from the adoption of these measures. Before the Act in question, the gaols were in a deplorable condition, but various improvements have since been effected. Tread-wheel labour and employments of various kinds have been introduced into several county prisons; and increased attention is paid to moral and religious instruction. To comply with the provisions of the Act, it was found necessary to build new gaols in several counties, and to enlarge others. Many of the small bridewells and prisons belonging to local jurisdictions have been abolished in pursuance of the statute.

In Ireland there are 42 county and city goals, and 106 houses of correction and bridewells. The expenses of the former amounted, in 1845, to 75,6581.

I. Return of the Number of Prisoners confined in the Gaols of Ireland on 3rd December, 1845.

II. Account showing the average daily Number of Prisoners confined in the different Gaols of Ireland in 1845; the total Number confined in the Year, Debtors included; and the Number of Recommittals.

CHAPTER V.-CHANGES OF FOOD, CLOTHING, AND LODGING. CLASSIFICATION AND INCOME OF THE PEOPLE.

To enter fully into the consideration of these interesting subjects would require not a short chapter, but a large volume. The real influence and practical operation of improvements in the arts and sciences are to be measured by their influence over the condition of the great bulk of the people; and, tried by this test, it will be found in Great Britain, as in most other countries, that they have been singularly advantageous. The comforts of all classes have been wonderfully augmented within the last two centuries. Probably, however, the labouring orders have been the principal gainers, as well by the large numbers of them who have succeeded in advancing themselves to a superior station, as by the many additional comforts that now fall to the share even of the poorest individuals. From the age of Henry VII. improvement in England has, a few short intervals only excepted, been pretty uniformly progressive; and though various circumstances have of late years conspired to check this advance, they would seem on the whole to have been counterbalanced or overcome. The vigorous and selfish policy of Henry, assisted, no doubt, by the course of events, subverted the foundations of the feudal system, and provided for the exaltation of the Crown and the law upon the ruins of the feudal nobility. The Reformation in the next reign, the rise of foreign commerce in the reign of Elizabeth, and the foundation of the colonies in North America and the West Indies in the reign of James I., gave a stimulus to industry and improvement which even the civil wars could not countervail; but which did not receive its full development till after the Restoration, or rather till after the peace of Paris in 1763. Without going farther back, we may mention, in proof of the disorderly and wretched state of the population in the early part of the sixteenth century, that Harrison tells us (Description of Britain, p. 186) that 72,000 66 great and petty thieves were put to death during the reign of Henry VIII." This account of the disorderly state of the kingdom, at the period in question, is corroborated by a statement preserved by Strype, written by an eminent justice of Somersetshire in 1596, wherein it is stated that "Forty persons had been executed (in that county), in a year, for robberies, thefts, and other felonies; 35 burnt in the hand; 37 whipped; 183 discharged: that those who were discharged were most wicked and desperate persons, who never could come to any good, because they would not work, and none would take them into service: that, notwithstanding these great number of indictments, the fifth part of the felonies committed in the county were not brought to trial; and the greater number escaped censure, either from the superior cunning of the felons, the remissness of the magistrates, or the foolish lenity of the people: that the rapines committed by the infinite number of wicked, wandering idle people were intolerable to the poor countrymen, and obliged them to a perpetual watch of their sheep-folds, pastures, woods, and corn-fields: that the other counties of England were in no better condition than Somersetshire; and many of them were even in a worse that there were, at least, 300 or 400 able-bodied vagabonds in every county, who lived by theft or rapine,

and who sometimes met in troops to the number of 60, and committed spoil on the inhabitants; that, if all the felons of this kind were reduced to good subjection, they would form a strong army: and that the magistrates were awed, by the associations and the threats of confederates, from executing justice on the offenders."-(Strype's Annals, vol. iv. p. 290.)

These disorders were partly, no doubt, occasioned by the dissolution of the monasteries, the consolidation of small farms, and, more than either or both of these causes, by the depreciation of the value of money, caused by the discovery of the American mines, and the enfeebling of the standard by Henry VIII. The necessity of providing some remedy for these aggravated disorders, or rather for obviating the poverty and destitution in which they mainly originated, led to the final establishment of the poor laws. But independently of the accidental circumstances now adverted to, the condition of the great bulk of the people in the sixteenth century was the most depressed imaginable. "The bread throughout the land," says Harrison, who wrote in the reign of Elizabeth, "is made of such graine as the soil yieldeth ; neverthelesse the gentilitie commonlie provide themselves sufficientlie of wheat for their owne tables, whilest their household and poore neigh bours, in some shires, are inforced to content themselves with rie or harleie; yea, and in time of dearth, manie with bread made either of bran, peason, or otes, or of altogether, and some acorns among; of which scourge the poorest doe soonest tast, sith they are least able to provide themselves of better. I will not saie that this extremitie is oft so well to be seene in time of plentie as of dearth; but, if I should, I could easilie bring my triall."-(Description of England, p. 168.)

Sir F. M. Eden, whose elaborate researches have thrown much light on this subject, truly states that the substantiality of diet, for which the sixteenth century is renowned, was confined chiefly to the tables of persons of rank. "A maid of honour, perhaps, breakfasted on roast beef; but the ploughman, in these good old times, as they are called, could, I fear, only banquet on the strength of water gruel.'"-(State of the Poor, vol. i. p. 116.)

6

But, if their provisions were coarse and deficient, their clothing and lodging were incomparably more so. The houses, even of the rich and great, were, in the sixteenth century, mostly destitute of glass windows; and the cottages of the poor were not only universally without them, but also without chimneys! The luxury of a linen shirt was confined to the higher classes. The cloth used by the bulk of the people was mostly of home manufacture; and, compared with what they now make use of, was at once costly, coarse, and comfortless. All classes, from the peer to the peasant, were universally without many articles the daily enjoyment of which is now deemed essential even by the poorest individuals. Tea and coffee were then wholly, and sugar almost wholly, unknown; and, notwithstanding all that is said of the rude hospitality, and of the consumption of ale and beer, in these remote times, it is probable that the labouring classes consume at this moment more malt liquor than their ancestors in either the fifteenth or the sixteenth century.

The superior condition of the bulk of the people in our own times