TALBOT8376

Moray Place
April 17^th

My dear Henry

Did you happen to read this statement about Workhouse Childⁿ in the ‘Times’ of the 13^th? I have no doubt of the existence of the evil which it deplores – and since reading it I regret more than ever the shutting up of our Lacock Poorhouse, where the children were so judiciously managed. – Suppose you were to call the attention of M^r Awdry to this extract which I enclose – does he not belong to the Board of Guardians? I hope you will be coming very soon to Edinburgh, for I long to hear your opinion of Millburn Tower¹ – and besides you will have barely time to get back to Lacock and collect your things by the date of taking possession of our new residence – this season promises to be very early – and the garden at Millburn is warm and sheltered – Ros^d & I were there on Monday, when we observed many Spring flowers coming on, besides such as are in perfection at the present time – We noticed a great many patches of the beautiful starch Hyacinth – what a lovely blue it is! – The cherry tree against the South Wall is in fine blossom – and the Gardener expresses himself very hopeful about everything –

Alas! for the stricken laurels! – they are looking wretched – & will have to be entirely cut down I suppose – but we shall miss them less when the trees come into leaf. – There is a large Ilex in the kitchen garden which appears to be dead – M^r Grieve had directed it to be cut down – but I thought of the what happened to our Bay tree more than once, and I begged they would wait a little – Now I want you to tell me whether the Ilex is ever known to recover after the manner of the Bay. – Perhaps before you come away from Lacock you will arrange with M^r Awdry as usual where he is to place the proceeds of the Rent day – In this case I would suggest (for my own convenience) that you should have a small portion paid into the Melksham Bank – I have some Bath & Lacock accounts that I could settle conveniently by drawing checks on Melksham – They are Stokes, Wright, Brickworth, M^r Crisp – Morrill, &c &c amounting in all to £64–

We have such a charming letter this morning from Matilda – at Speddoch – full of delight with her cats & dogs and garden – and the weather favored them so much – We were walking along George S^t Yesterday, enjoying a really warm, serene day, – and in general it has been very fine indeed latterly. always dry & bright – Today it is rather foggy – but this is attributable to the East wind.

your affectionate
Constance

[enclosed newspaper article]

Workhouse Children. – The report of the Education Commission draws a very melancholy picture of the condition of the children in workhouses. Workhouse influences have a very marked tendency to produce helplessness and prevent the growth of independence of character. An Assistant-Commissioner, remarks that it is difficult to convey a definite idea of a child brought up from its infancy in the workhouse. Doomed never to have known the meaning of “home,” cut off from the exercise of the ordinary affections, in many instances diseased in body and feeble in mind, these poor children exhibit little of the vigour and joyousness of youth. Listless and subservient in manner, they seem to be broken down by misfortune before they have entered upon life. Such a child is content to spend its days in a workhouse. The Commissioner says: – “Some of the tradesmen who had taken union boys as apprentices told me that it took several years before they acquired the desire for independence – the wish to earn their own bread.” This is especially the case where there is little or no industrial training; boys who have never been accustomed to handle a spade, and girls who have never had to scrub the floors, rebel when they are put to such work. On the other hand, association with older paupers for industrial training tends the more to corrupt them. “It seems impossible to exaggerate the spirit of lying, low dunning, laziness, insubordination, and profligacy which characterizes the pauper class in workhouses, and this spirit naturally infects the mass of poor children who are bred up in so pestilential an atmosphere.” The case is even more hopeless with the girls than with the boys. The adult single women in the house have often children whom they are allowed to see, and the girls cannot learn any domestic duty without coming occasionally in contact with this class, who are employed in household work. Girls just going out into the liberty of the world are brought in contact with them, as they sit by a good fire nursing their babies and gossiping. The girls mix also with the children of tramps and of paupers coming in for a very short time, and who bring in evil enough to undo any good the teacher may do; and all the children who have parents in the house are liable to be taken out with them when they choose to leave for a few days, perhaps to attend a fair. A good schoolmistress said “she felt she was training up girls for a life of vice and infamy. ” “ One girl,” says another mistress, “and not a bad specimen of a pauper girl, said to me the other day, ‘My cousin Sally left the house some time ago, and now she has come back with a baby, and I hope I shall soon go out and come back too with a baby.’” Now, there is a known remedy for this sad state of things, – the establishment of district or separate schools at a distance from the workhouse, withdrawing the children entirely from the adults and from bad parental influence, for such we know it is. Such schools where established, have had the most remarkable and striking success. The object kept in view is to emancipate the children from pauperism, teach then not to become paupers themselves, and open a better life to them; and these schools offer the best prospect of a permanent diminution of pauperism and crime. But the guardians are unwilling to establish them; in 1859 there were only 7,000 children in them, and 37,000 in the workhouses. There seems no resource but by the Legislature interposing to close this fountain of evil.