In Darkest England and The Way Out [168]
I I --------------------------------------------------------------------- I How much did you earn when I irregularly employed? I I --------------------------------------------------------------------- I Are you married? I I --------------------------------------------------------------------- I Is wife living? I I --------------------------------------------------------------------- I How many children and ages? I I --------------------------------------------------------------------- If you were put on a farm to I work at anything you could do, I and were supplied with food, I lodging, and clothes, with a I view to getting you on your feet, I would you do all you could? I ---------------------------------------------------------------------
HOW BEGGARY WAS ABOLISHED IN BAVARIA BY COUNT RUMFORD.
Count Rumford was an American officer who served with considerable distinction in the Revolutionary War in that country, and afterwards settled in England. From thence he went to Bavaria, where he was promoted to the chief command of its army, and also was energetically employed in the Civil Government. Bavaria at this time literally swarmed with beggars, who were not only an eyesore and discredit to the nation, but a positive injury to the State. The Count resolved upon the extinction of this miserable profession, and the following extracts from his writings describe the method by which he accomplished it: --
"Bavaria, by the neglect of the Government, and the abuse of the kindness and charity of its amiable people, had become infested with beggars, with whom mingled vagabonds and thieves. They were to the body politic what parasites and vermin are to people and dwellings-- breeding by the same lazy neglect."--(Page 14.)
"In Bavaria there were laws which made provision for the poor, but they suffered them to fall into neglect. Beggary had become general."-- (Page 15.)
"In short," says Count Rumford, "these detestable vermin swarmed everywhere; and not only their impudence and clamorous importunity were boundless, but they had recourse to the most diabolical arts and the most horrid crimes in the prosecution of their infamous trade. They exposed and tortured their own children, and those they stole for the purpose, to extort contributions from the charitable."--(Page 15.)
"In the large towns beggary was an organised imposture, with a sort of government and police of its own. Each beggar had his beat, with orderly successions and promotions, as with other governments. There were battles to decide conflicting claims, and a good beat was not unfreguently a marriage portion or a thumping legacy."--(Page 16.)
"He saw that it was not enough to forbid beggary by law or to punish it by imprisonment. The beggars cared for neither. The energetic Yankee Statesman attacked the question as he did problems in physical science. He studied beggary and beggars. How would he deal with one individual beggar? Send him for a month to prison to beg again as soon as he came out? That is no remedy. The evident course was to forbid him to beg, but at the same time to give him the opportunity to labor; to teach him to work, to encourage him to honest industry. And the wise ruler sets himself to provide food, comfort, and work for every beggar and vagabond in Bavaria, and did it."--(Page 17.)
"Count Rumford, wise and just, sets himself to reform the whole class of beggars and vagabonds, and convert them into useful citizens, even those who had sunk into vice and crime.
"'What,' he asked himself, 'is, after the necessaries of life, the first condition of comfort?' Cleanliness, which animals and insects prize, which in man
HOW BEGGARY WAS ABOLISHED IN BAVARIA BY COUNT RUMFORD.
Count Rumford was an American officer who served with considerable distinction in the Revolutionary War in that country, and afterwards settled in England. From thence he went to Bavaria, where he was promoted to the chief command of its army, and also was energetically employed in the Civil Government. Bavaria at this time literally swarmed with beggars, who were not only an eyesore and discredit to the nation, but a positive injury to the State. The Count resolved upon the extinction of this miserable profession, and the following extracts from his writings describe the method by which he accomplished it: --
"Bavaria, by the neglect of the Government, and the abuse of the kindness and charity of its amiable people, had become infested with beggars, with whom mingled vagabonds and thieves. They were to the body politic what parasites and vermin are to people and dwellings-- breeding by the same lazy neglect."--(Page 14.)
"In Bavaria there were laws which made provision for the poor, but they suffered them to fall into neglect. Beggary had become general."-- (Page 15.)
"In short," says Count Rumford, "these detestable vermin swarmed everywhere; and not only their impudence and clamorous importunity were boundless, but they had recourse to the most diabolical arts and the most horrid crimes in the prosecution of their infamous trade. They exposed and tortured their own children, and those they stole for the purpose, to extort contributions from the charitable."--(Page 15.)
"In the large towns beggary was an organised imposture, with a sort of government and police of its own. Each beggar had his beat, with orderly successions and promotions, as with other governments. There were battles to decide conflicting claims, and a good beat was not unfreguently a marriage portion or a thumping legacy."--(Page 16.)
"He saw that it was not enough to forbid beggary by law or to punish it by imprisonment. The beggars cared for neither. The energetic Yankee Statesman attacked the question as he did problems in physical science. He studied beggary and beggars. How would he deal with one individual beggar? Send him for a month to prison to beg again as soon as he came out? That is no remedy. The evident course was to forbid him to beg, but at the same time to give him the opportunity to labor; to teach him to work, to encourage him to honest industry. And the wise ruler sets himself to provide food, comfort, and work for every beggar and vagabond in Bavaria, and did it."--(Page 17.)
"Count Rumford, wise and just, sets himself to reform the whole class of beggars and vagabonds, and convert them into useful citizens, even those who had sunk into vice and crime.
"'What,' he asked himself, 'is, after the necessaries of life, the first condition of comfort?' Cleanliness, which animals and insects prize, which in man