Chapter 6

There are, in every fully-peopled country, large numbers of persons whose lives are passed in hardship and misery, and whose greatest exertions can do no more for them than procure the barest means of subsistence. These are greatly to be pitied, and it should be the study of the government, and of all who possess the means, to remove, as far as possible, the causes of their misfortune. It cannot, however, be said that any competition, save only that which they themselves naturally and necessarily exhibit among their class, for obtaining the inadequate amount of employment for which they are fitted, is chargeable with the hardships they endure. It is a melancholy truth, as concerns the individuals, that we cannot extend to them any indirect relief without tending to increase the evil by raising an addition to their number. How, then, is their condition to be mended? The only way, it appears to me, is to fit them for entering into competition with others above them in the social scale by means of instruction, which shall enable them to give a greater value to the services which they render, and thus entitle them to command a greater value of services in return. We need entertain no fear lest, by this letting in competition upon the class above them, we shall lower these latter in the scale of society. So long as the capital in the country shall continue to increase in a greater proportion than its population, there must always be found additional employment and better remuneration for those whose labour is capable of adding to the national wealth. It may with more truth be stated, that the consequence to the community of the existence of any large number of destitute persons, is to keep down the general rate of wages, positively, through the absorption of capital required for their relief, and, negatively, through the absence of those additions to capital which the surplus services of instructed artisans always occasion.--_G. R. Porter's Lecture at Wandsworth, entitled 'Services for Services.' London: Clowes._ 1851.

A WEE BIT NAME.

SHEPHERD _loquitur_.--An' a wee bit name--canna it carry a weight o' love?--_Noctes Ambrosianæ_, No. lxxii.

A wee bit name! O wae's the heart When nought but _that_ is left, But doubly dear it comes to be When time a' else hath reft, An' youth, an' hope, an' innocence, An' happiness, an' hame, Are a' concentred in a word, That word--a wee bit name.

Back through the weary waste o' years My memory is borne, An' gurglin' streams, an' thickets green, An' fields o' yellow corn: An' lanely glens, an' sunny hills Upon my spirit gleam, The phantoms o' the past before That spell--a wee bit name.

O vision sweet! a fair, fair face, A young, but thochtfu' brow, Twa gentle een o' azure sheen, Are beamin' on me noo. Be still, my beatin' heart--be still; It's but an idle dream: She heeds na though wi' tremblin' joy I breathe a wee bit name.

A wee bit name! O lives there ane That never, never felt Its pathos an' its wizard power To saften and to melt? No--callous though the bosom be Wi' years o' sin an' shame, 'Twill melt like snaw in summer's sun Before some wee bit name.

A wee bit name! the rod whose touch Bids hidden waters start, The torch that lichts the pile upon The altar o' the heart, An' kindles what wad else decay, Into a holy flame: A sacred influence may lie Within a wee bit name!

C.

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End of Project Gutenberg's Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 453, by Various