discipline which falls lightly on a man, is perdition to the moral and physical nature of a woman; that the unfathomable cunning and irritable temper of the female convicts are more difficult to deal with than the stupidity and ferocity of the men, and require a wholly distinct management; that with the male convicts a low diet is often found beneficial, while with the women a low diet brings on an incipient lunacy; the punishment of bread and water diet is much less thought of by the women than by the men; they do not care for it; but while less effective as a punishment, it invariably does mischief. It is proved that the male convicts may be treated in masses and governed by routine, but that the women require, as a necessary condition of health, a more individual treatment; that in spite of the debased lives of these wretched females, in spite of frames rendered coarse by perpetual labour, and tempers cruel from perpetual ill usage, there remains an original delicacy of the nervous organisation which makes the more impressionable creature not only suffer, but deteriorate under a sort of discipline which would be scarcely felt by the stronger sex. This explains, I think, the common observation that depraved women are more unmanageable than depraved men. The same means are tried on both alike, and are not applicable to both alike; where the man is merely punished as society has the right to punish him, the woman is by the same process irretrievably destroyed. "With women," said one of the chaplains, "there is a period beyond which it is unsafe as well as useless to punish." While pleading against the separation of the sexes in all social intercourse, and for their equal moral responsibility before God and the tribunals of their country, we Englishwomen agree with all intelligent men that there are vital differences which ought not to be lost sight of. We think it hard that such differences should be insisted on where they can be turned

HOSPITALS FOR WOMEN AND CHILDREN.

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against us, and ignored where they ought to be recognised to our advantage; and we ask that these essential differences and requirements should be more considered, not only in the management of prisons, but in workhouses, asylums, factories, and all institutions in which men and women are relatively concerned.

I have ventured to call your Lordship's attention to these recent experiments in prison discipline, because Englishwomen are of opinion that the same principle of an interfusion of female, or what might be called maternal management, is even more obviously applicable to other institutions. For instance, there are two hospitals in London for the treatment of women and female diseases which are governed by men only; and, what is a still more curious anomaly, we have an hospital for sick children in which the constituted authorities consist of twenty-six men, (lords and gentlemen) and one woman in a subservient position. I have been myself a subscriber to this excellent institution from its commencement, and I know ladies who have contributed largely, generously, as in duty bound; for what woman, what mother, does not feel the value of such an institution? yet when we go there we are merely tolerated. We are "visitors," and may, with the obliging matron's permission, walk over the wards, where, on committee-days, I have myself seen gentlemen, with beard and moustache, and with a lordly air, walking about and examining into all the kind and motherly arrangements for infant accommodation. There is something strangely absurd in all this. Absurd, too, is it not, to see a hundred benevolent gentlemen dining at the Freemasons' Tavern for the benefit of the poor sick babies, and making most eloquent, most pathetic appeals to Christian, and especially feminine compassion, while ladies. matrons and mothers - sit up in a sort of dark cage and look on,—not ungrateful for this exhibition of masculine sympathy,-O far from it!

only silently wondering how long a state of things so unseemly, so ridiculous, so unpractical, is to endure in this our decorous, dignified, practical England; and how long the capacities and privileges of women are to be lowered in the estimation of the community by shutting them out of what is surely within the "woman's proper sphere."

Perhaps, however, the greatest, the most fatal mistake which has ever been committed by the exclusion of female supervision, where females are concerned, is the present management of our workhouses.

I have at page 110 endeavoured to portray some of the evils of the present system. Revolting as that picture is, I cannot bate one line of it; not one of the particulars there set down has ever been contradicted: on the contrary, I have had, in letters and other communications from chaplains, ladies, and guardians of the poor, the confirmation of all I have stated. It is true that since these Essays were published, that is, within the last four years, some amelioration of these almost incredible mischiefs has taken place in some few localities. Our great London Unions are not precisely in the same state as when some notable examples were reported to the Poor-Law Commissioners. They are not absolutely the abodes of unmitigated filth, vice, tyranny, and torment. This innovation may be traced in great measure to the attention excited by individual cases of misery and oppression, and thence extended to the whole system; and this has led to the formation of a society called the "Workhouse Visiting Society;" with a committee of gentlemen and ladies, numbering at this time about a hundred and fifty members. The objects of this association are to promote the moral and spiritual improvement of the workhouse inmates; to instruct and comfort the sick and afflicted; to befriend the destitute and orphan children; to humanise the ignorant and depraved adults, especially the women."

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To prevent all fear of collision, the members are "to act only with the sanction of the guardians and chaplains; are to visit only at hours convenient to the officials; are to abstain from all interference with the constituted authorities and all meddling with the religious opinions of those who differ with them." Such a society does not seem very dangerous; yet the announcement threw the boards of guardians into a ferment. It became a question whether these lady-visitors were or were not to be admitted: terrible were the mischiefs anticipated from "female interference" (and interference it certainly is, so long as it is unsanctioned and unauthorised, no denying this part of the difficulty);-terrible the collision which was inevitably to take place between educated conscientious women and ignorant and hitherto irresponsible officials! In some few parishes, after discussions " by no means complimentary to the fair sex," these benevolent ladies have been admitted, and, under strict regulations, just tolerated: in others, they have been rejected by a majority of the guardians in others ignored altogether, and treated with contempt. Now there are in the workhouses of England and Wales 52,000 female inmates, and more than 40,000 children; and Englishwomen are naturally desirous that, with regard to these women and children, some moral supervision of a higher kind than that which now exists should be introduced by the parish authorities. In the parish I inhabit are great numbers of widows and unmarried women who pay heavy taxes for the maintenance of the poor; and we cannot understand why we should be absolutely prohibited from all attempts to benefit them morally, and treated as if the wish to do so were a piece of impertinent presumption. We are called upon to minister in refuges for the fallen of our sex, but we are not permitted to use such means as are in our power to prevent the fall of hundreds; for the workhouse system, as I have shown, is

the perdition of girls, and in the perdition of girls just entering into life, lies the perdition of many homes.*

Englishwomen desire that there should be some enquiry into the condition of these places:-how far they fulfil their purpose as Christian and charitable institutions; how far they fulfil their merely economic purpose of keeping down pauperism and vice; what has been the result where lady-visitors have been introduced in some localities, and for what reasons the door has been closed against them in others. It has long been acknowledged by our legislation, that one purpose of a prison is to reform the criminal, but it seems still to be a part of the creed of our municipalities, that one purpose of a workhouse is to punish paupers.† We know too well what spectacles of vice, laziness, and all kinds and degrees of unconvicted crime are to be found within those wretched precincts. But is no ameliorating process to be even attempted? are Englishwomen of tender hearts and good understanding, and gentle and discreet bearing, to be rejected as unfit guardians of the destitute of their own sex; 'not to be allowed to take an interest in them, yet taxed to contribute to a system which in their conscience they detest? Ladies who have been district-visitors, who have ministered to the sick and aged poor in their homes, think it hard that their protégés should be absolutely abandoned when they enter a workhouse. It has been a reproach to the poor that they would rather go to the prison than go to the Union, and I believe that there are parish officials who would gladly encourage such notions among the parish poor. Now it must be acknowledged that the Reformatory Prison at Fulham is a paradise

Vide "Transactions of the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science:" "On the Objects and Aims of the Workhouse Visiting Society," by Louisa Twining."

At a meeting of a board of guardians, it was stated by one of the gentlemen present, that workhouses were not built for age, for the des titute orphans, for the sick and disabled, but "expressly for the slothful and depraved;" and he was applauded.