with him, how he worked for them, and how his family has lived
in the parish as cottagers from time immemorial. A reminiscence of a grim
joke that fell out forty years before, and of which the deceased was the
butt, causes a grave smile, and then to business again. The master
possibly asks permission to punish a refractory inmate; punishment is now
very sparingly given in the house. A good many cases, however, come up
from the Board to the magisterial Bench--charges of tearing up clothing,
fighting, damaging property, or of neglecting to maintain, or to repay
relief advanced on loan. These cases are, of course, conducted by the
clerk.

There is sometimes a report, to be read by one of the doctors who receive
salaries from the Board and attend to the various districts, and
occasionally some nuisance to be considered and order taken for its
compulsory removal on sanitary grounds. The question of sanitation is
becoming rather a difficult one in agricultural unions.

After this the various committees of the Board have to give in the result
of their deliberations, and the representative of the ladies' boarding-out
committee presents a record of the work accomplished. These various
committees at times are burdened with the most onerous labours, for upon
them falls the duty of verifying all the petty details of management.
Every pound of soap, or candles, scrubbing-brushes, and similar domestic
items, pass under their inspection, not only the payments for them, but
the actual articles, or samples of them, being examined. Tenders for
grocery, bread, wines and spirits for cases of illness, meat, coals, and
so forth are opened and compared, vouchers, bills, receipts, invoices, and
so forth checked and audited.

The amount of detail thus attended to is something immense, and the
accuracy required occupies hour after hour. There are whole libraries of
account-books, ledgers, red-bound relief-books, stowed away, pile upon
pile, in the house; archives going back to the opening of the
establishment, and from which any trifling relief given or expenditure
inclined years ago can be extracted. Such another carefully-administered
institution it would be hard to find; nor is any proposed innovation or
change adopted without the fullest discussion--it may be the suggested
erection of additional premises, or the introduction of some fresh feature
of the system, or some novel instructions sent down by the Local
Government Board.

When suc