LETTER XVIII.

_THE POOR AND THEIR DWELLINGS._

Bene paupertas Humili tecto contenta latet.

_Seneca_ [Octavia, Act V. vv. 895-6].

Omnes quibu' res sunt minu' secundæ, magi' sunt, nescio quo modo, Suspiciosi; ad contumeliam omnia accipiunt magis; Propter suam impotentiam se semper credunt negligi.

_Terent. in Adelph._ Act 4. Sc. 3 [vv. 12-4].

Show not to the poor thy pride, Let their home a cottage be; Nor the feeble body hide In a palace fit for thee; Let him not about him see Lofty ceilings, ample halls, Or a gate his boundary be, Where nor friend or kinsman calls.

Let him not one walk behold, That only one which he must tread, Nor a chamber large and cold, Better far his humble shed, Where the aged and sick are led; Humble sheds of neighbours by, And the old and tatter'd bed, Where he sleeps and hopes to die.

To quit of torpid sluggishness the [lair], And from the pow'rful arms of sloth [get] free, 'Tis rising from the dead--Alas! it cannot be.

_Thomson's Castle of Indolence_ [Canto II. ll. 59-61].

The Method of treating the Borough Paupers--Many maintained at their own Dwellings--Some Characters of the Poor--The School-mistress, when aged--The Idiot--The poor Sailor--The declined Tradesman and his Companion--This contrasted with the Maintenance of the Poor in a common Mansion erected by the Hundred--The Objections to this Method: not Want, nor Cruelty, but the necessary Evils of this Mode--What they are--Instances of the Evil--A Return to the Borough Poor--The Dwellings of these--The Lanes and By-ways--No Attention here paid to Convenience--The Pools in the Path-ways--Amusements of Sea-port Children--The Town-Flora--Herbs on Walls and vacant Spaces--A female Inhabitant of an Alley--A large Building let to several poor Inhabitants--Their Manners and Habits.