ystematic movements of these people led me to inquire in regard
to their conduct and policy from an adjacent shop-keeper, who told me,
that about a dozen of them obtained a good living in that passage;
that an attendance of about two hours per day sufficed to each of
them, when, by an arrangement among themselves, they regularly succeed
each other. He could not guess at the amounts thus collected, but he
said, that he had once watched a noisy blind fellow for half an hour,
and in that time saw thirty-four people give him at least as many
halfpence; he thence, and from other observations, concluded that in
two or three hours each of them collects five or six shillings! We
cannot wonder then at the aversion entertained by these unhappy
objects to the indiscriminate discipline of our common work-houses;
nor can we blame the sympathy of those benevolent persons who
contribute their mite to relieve the cries of distress with which they
are assailed. But it excites our wonder and grief that statesmen, who
have superfluous means for covering the country with barracks, should
find themselves unable to establish comfortable asylums for all the
poor who are incurably diseased, in which they should be so provided
for, that it would be as criminal in them to ask, as in others to
afford them, eleemosynary relief.

On my entrance into the Park, I was amused and interested by an
assemblage of a hundred mothers, nurses, and valetudinarians,
accompanied by as many children, who are drawn together at this hour
every fine morning by the metropolitan luxury of milk warm from the
cow. Seats are provided, as well as biscuits, and other conveniences,
and here from sun-rise till ten o'clock continues a _milk fair_,
distinguished by its peculiar music in the _lowing_ of cows, and in
the discordant _squalling_ of the numerous children. The privilege of
keeping these cows, and of selling their milk on this spot, belongs to
the gate-keepers of the Park; and it must be acknowledged to be a
great convenience to invalids and children, to whom this wholesome
beverage and its attendant walk are often prescribed.

On the right hand stands the garden-wall of the puny, though costly,
palace of the Regent, Prince of Wales. It is, however, fortunate, that
it is not larger, if the expenditure of palaces, like that of private
houses, were to keep pace with their bulk. The inside is adorned like
the palace of Aladin; and a better notion of its splendour may b