uence; for if we mean to improve the general
character of the labouring population, there is nothing like beginning
in time; and we should, amongst other things, get rid of all mean and
improper customs.

Before concluding this chapter I would hint to travellers not to give
children money for running after a coach. I have seen children of both
sexes run until their breath failed, and, completely exhausted, drop
down on the grass; merely because some injudicious persons had thrown
halfpence to them. I have also seen little boys turn over and over
before the horses, for the purpose of getting money, to the danger of
their own lives and of the passengers; and I recollect an instance of
one boy being, in consequence, killed on the spot. In some counties
children will, in spring and summer, run after a carriage with flowers
upon a long stick, thrusting it in the coach or the faces of the
travellers, begging halfpence, which habit had been taught them by the
same injudicious means.

The most virtuous and pious of men, on looking back to their early
lives, have almost invariably confessed that they owe the first
seeds of what is excellent in them, to the blessing of God, on the
instruction and example of their parents, and those around them in the
years of their childhood.

Reflections like these ought to make us humble and thankful for the
advantages we have enjoyed, and cause us to look with an eye of pity,
charity, and commiseration on the vices and delinquencies of the poor,
rather than to judge them with harsh and cruel severity. Had we been
in their places, might not--would not--our character and conduct have
been as theirs?--Still further, ought not such thoughts as these to
touch our hearts with deep compassion for them, and excite us to
strenuous endeavours to remedy these lamentable evils, by the most
powerful and effective measures that can be found; and more especially
to strive if possible to rescue the rising generation from the
contamination of surrounding vice and misery.

CHAPTER IV.

REMEDY FOR EXISTING EVILS.

_Means long in operation important--Prisons awfully
corrupting--Deplorable condition of those released from
jail--Education of the infant poor--Its beneficial results--Cases
of inviolable honesty--Appeal of Mr. Serjeant Bosanquet--The infant
school, an asylum from accidents, and a prevention of various
evils--Obstacles in the way of married persons obtaining
employment--Arguments for the