difficulties, if a great nation, like France, would identify herself with them, and make them the leading aim of her external policy.

These are worthy objects; but it may be doubted whether a nation, to which it is necessary to recommend them as means of regaining that importance in the world, which can no longer be successfully sought by war and conquest, is the most likely to render them acceptable to other nations. Plato says, that a people ought to search out and impress as its Governors the persons who most dislike and avoid the office. It is certain, that those who eagerly thrust themselves into other people's disputes, though it be only as arbitrators, are seldom very cordially welcomed ; and that those are rarely the best managers of other people's affairs, who have most taste for the bustle and self-importance of management. If, however, men have a taste for meddling, it is better that they should meddle to befriend others, than to oppress and domineer over them; and M. Duveyrier is doing a useful thing, in inculcating upon his countrymen the superiority of the more philanthropic mode of indulging the propensity.

In domestic policy he proclaims the same principle, of peaceful arbitration; the adjustment of conflicting interests, with the least possible hardship and disturbance to any one. His watch

words are, justice and compromise. To postpone all partial interests to the general interest, but to compensate liberally all from whom sacrifices of their private interest are demanded; and to make up, as far as circumstances permit, to the weaker and less fortunate members of society, for whatever disadvantages they lie under in their relations with the strong:-these are his maxims.

Under these different heads, he opens various subjects of discussion; some of which are by no means ripe for a final opinion, and to which we can only cursorily allude. That he is for a progressive reduction of protecting duties, is a matter of course. He has, at the same time, much to say in favour of alleviating the losses of those who suffer by reforms in legislation; or even by improvements in production. These, however, are minor topics compared with one from which no political thinker of any importance can now avert his thoughts -the improvement of the existing relations between what is designated as the labouring portion of the community, and their employers: the question known to Continental thinkers under the technical appellation of the Organization of Labour.

This is not a subject upon which to enter at the conclusion of an article, nor is it in any sense a principal topic of M. Duveyrier's book. He contents himself with pointing to it in the

distance, as a problem waiting for a solution in the depths of futurity. It is possible that, like most French philanthropists, he has in view, as an ultimate possibility, a greater degree of authoritative intervention in contracts relating to labour, than would conduce to the desired end; or be consistent with the proper limits of the functions of government. But he proposes for present adoption, nothing but what is reasonable and useful. He bids the government encourage and favour what is voluntarily done by employers of labour, to raise their labourers from the situation of hired servants, to that of partners in the concern, having a pecuniary interest in the profits. He recommends to honour and imitation the example of M. Leclaire, (mentioned in a former number of this Review,) who has organized his business on the plan of allowing to himself, as well as to each of his employés, a fixed salary; and sharing the surplus among the whole body in rateable proportion to the salaries; and who, it appears, has found this system even lucrative to himself, as well as highly advantageous to his labourers.

We have exhibited, we think, enough of the contents of these volumes to justify our favourable opinion of them. On the unfavourable side there is little that we think it important to notice, except a degree of flattery to some of the Chiefs of the ruling party, and especially to the present King of the French ;probably, however, in the author's eyes, not exceeding the courtesy due to persons in high authority, from one of their own supporters, when he volunteers important, and not always agreeable advice. The style is easy and spirited, occasionally rising into eloquence; and not more diffuse than belongs to the nature of modern periodical writing.

ART. VIII. A Bill intituled an Act for Securing the Due Administration of Charitable Trusts in England and Wales. Ordered by the House of Lords to be Printed, 19th February 1846.

THE

HE Bill for securing the due Administration of Charitable Trusts in England and Wales, is one of the most important administrative measures which has been proposed during the present century.

It affects more than Ten Thousand Charities, actually receiving an income of more than £1,500,000 a-year, and entitled to much more, and managed by at least 50,000 Trustees. The extent of the Land reported by the Commissioners of enquiry into Charities, as ascertained by them to belong to the Charities which they examined, is 442,915 acres. The greater part of this land is in the immediate neighbourhood of towns. Much of it, therefore, is building-ground, and the remainder, from its situation, more valuable than the average land of England. At £100 an acre it would be worth more than forty-four millions. But a large portion of the land is omitted—the quantity not having been ascertained. The sites of houses are also omitted, and a considerable portion of charity land is covered by them. In the first ten columns of the Analytical Digest of the Commissioners' Reports, we find seven hundred and seventy-five houses; and as there are eight hundred and twenty-four such columns, if these ten be, as is probably the case, a fair specimen, the whole number of houses must be above sixty-three thousand; worth, at £200 a house, more than twelve millions more. To this must be added the value of rent-charges, mortgages, and funded property. And there must be further added the property of the numerous Charities to which the enquiries of the Commissioners did not extend. On the whole, we are inclined to believe that the whole value of the lands, houses, rent-charges, and personal property permanently dedicated in England and Wales to Charitable Purposes, is not less than from seventy-five to one hundred millions. Of this vast property, a considerable part is withheld by claimants under adverse titles, or under no title at all, or by fraudulent lessees. Of the remainder, by far the larger portion is now employed usefully, but yet in a manner capable of improvement; a great portion is wasted on purposes useless, though not positively injurious; and no inconsiderable part is applied in a manner absolutely mischievous, in political corruption, or in the encouragement of idleness or improvidence. Many a borough owes its venal electors, and

many a parish its paupers, to the unwise or ill-administered charities of its benefactors.

The only remedy by which the robbery, waste, or misapplication of a charitable fund can be stopped, is an application to the Court of Chancery. That court is unquestionably in many respects an admirable Tribunal. It is powerful, wise, and just. If it were cheap, if it were only moderately costly, it would be the best court in Europe. Unhappily, it is one of the most expensive that the world has ever seen. This arises principally from its excessive centralization. Every matter referred to it must be heard and decided in London. The first consequence is, that every enquiry, unless it be a mere London question, must be managed by four sets of Solicitors. There must, first, be the Solicitors of each party in the country, and then each of these Solicitors acts through the London Solicitor who is his agent. Thus four sets of expenses are incurred. In the next place, either the whole evidence must be written, or the witnesses must travel to London, and remain there, until their evidence is wanted. Matters that might be investigated and disposed of in five or six days, by a Judge on the spot, last through as many years, and cost as many hundreds, when the enquiry takes place two hundred miles off, and is managed by persons who, as they always urge in excuse of their ignorance of facts, are mere agents, and must constantly refer for information and instructions to their country correspon→ dents. Under such circumstances, in any small charity, however gross be the fraud, however mischievous the abuse, to invoke the Court of Chancery is knowingly and designedly to make justice a present of the Oyster.

In the Case of the Attorney-general v. Nethercoat, the income of a charity property worth about L.3000, had been misapplied in payment of poor rates and church rates. An information was filed in the Court of Chancery, and a long litigation ensued; the expense of which, from time to time, was partially defrayed by sales of portions of the property. At length, a final decree was made, which declared that the income of the charity ought in future to be applied for the benefit of the poor not receiving relief from the rates--removed the existing trustees-and directed the further costs to be raised by sale or mortgage, and a scheme to be framed for the application of the residuary income.

The property now remaining was an estate producing L.105 a-year. The unsatisfied costs amounted to L.2000. That sum was raised by mortgage at four and a half per cent. There remains therefore, for the purposes of the charity, L.15 a-year, being about one-tenth of the original income!

In another Case, an information was filed to ascertain, among other things, the boundaries of some charity lands. A hedge had been grubbed up, and the land taken in by a neighbouring occupier. The site of the hedge was worth about L.20. L.200 was spent in ascertaining whether it belonged to the charity or to the owner of the adjoining freehold. As a general rule, it may be laid down, that the instant a charity not exceeding L.30 a-year becomes the subject of a suit, it is gone. One of L.60 a-year is reduced one half, one of L.100 a-year, one third. The prudent friends of such a charity, will submit to see it mismanaged to any extent short of the destruction of all its utility, rather than risk its utter annihilation by the ruinous protection of the court. But a charity has often in its neighbourhood friends who are not prudent, or whose prudence is overcome by their hostility to its actual administrators; or, what is worse than even imprudent friends, Attorneys anxious for business. Its administration is denounced in the vestry, or in the town-hall, as illegal, corrupt, and mischievous. The Trustees defend it as one of the few samples of perfect wisdom, and perfect disinterestedness. The Attorneys inflame the disputants. An information is filed, costs are incurred, it is perceived that the party which fails will have to pay the greater part of them; and the contest goes on perhaps, for years, for no practical purposes but giving profit to the Attorneys, and deciding out of whose pocket it is to come.

But this enormous, devouring expensiveness, is not the only quality which unfits the Court of Chancery for the superintend ence of Charities. It is subject to the further defect, that its action is merely judicial and legal. It cannot act, therefore, until it is set in motion by some formal complaint. Whatever be the abuses to which a charity is misapplied, the court can take no notice of them, unless and until some one calls its attention by a bill, a petition, or an information. And the abuses which it can rectify are only technical abuses; that is to say, the application of the property to purposes which the founder did not sanction. It is in vain that the Trustees urge, that what are called abuses are, in fact, improvements; that they are such as the founder, if he had lived in these times, must have desired; that the object which he had in view two hundred and fifty years ago, has ceased to be beneficial; or that the means which he directed to be employed, have ceased to be effective. The Court cannot enter into these questions of expediency. Its duty is to see that the Will of the Founder is adhered to. He founded, perhaps, a grammar school, in which ten boys were to be taught Latin. A commercial school has been substituted, in which two hundred are taught English. It is in vain that the neighbours