visitors would also be able to report for several societies at once; and, by a mutual interchange of good offices, the maximum of economy as well as efficiency in visiting would be obtained. It does not seem desirable to fix any limit to the number of families in charge of each visitor. The capacity and intelligence as well as the leisure of visitors varies so much that a wide margin should be left. It would be well if all visitors were furnished with printed cards, giving the addresses of the principal local charitable and medical relief agencies, as many persons in distress have been found utterly ignorant where to apply, or how to obtain any assist

ance.

The establishment of a central office, where all the societies, their executives and subscribers, could meet on neutral ground, would enable any person to ascertain the names and requirements of casual applicants directed to apply there; while, on the other hand, information would be given to applicants at the office, directing them to their proper agencies of relief. Such an office should be placed in a convenient and well-known locality, easily accessible from all parts of the town. All cases of alleged or apparent distress should be sent there for investigation; while the power vested in the office of relieving immediate suffering should be commensurate with the confidence felt by the public that such aid would be impartially and wisely given.

The foregoing remarks will be sufficient to explain the general working of charitable matters in New York. It would be easy to emphasize them by an abundance of figures, but such figures have a tendency to deceive any one searching for accurate statistical information. There is so little uniformity of method among the societies, that while with some the number of families or individuals relieved represents that number of separate cases, with others the same cases will be repeated as if they were fresh ones over and over again. It will only be after concerted action and community of interests have been forced upon those now engaged in carrying on the benevolent work of New York, that we shall be able to understand the statistics annually furnished by them.

It may be supposed from what has been said, that the administration of out-door relief is especially faulty in New York; but this is not the case, nor is it without good hope of remedy. The conditions of the city, topographically, economically, and politically, have much to do with the existing difficulties. The city itself covers Manhattan Island, with an area of more than 12,500

acres, divided by survey into some 142,000 building-lots of 25 x 100. The population is estimated at 1,050,000 at the present moment.

The island is 13 miles long by 2 wide at its extreme points, and the area of the city has been doubled recently by the addition of nearly 12,500 acres, or 18 square miles, taken from Westchester County, with a population of 36,000. The city proper, on the island, is divided into twenty-two wards, varying from 81 to 5,500 acres in size, and from 1,000 to 119,000 in population. It is clear, then, that the “ward" must be an inconvenient integer in districting the city for charitable or any other work. For police, fire, educational, sanitary, and other purposes, each department takes its own more convenient division. The population, which is most densely congregated in the lower six miles of the town, averaging say 200,000 to the square mile, consists in nearly equal parts of persons of native and of foreign birth, the former slightly predominating. Nearly one-half of the inhabitants live in tenement-houses, which are estimated at about 24,000 in number. The mortality in 1877 amounted to 26,200, of which 12,300 were children under five years. The effect of overcrowding is shown by the mortality being three and a half times as great among the tenementhouse population as among the other half of the inhabitants. This fact, coupled with the proportion of three cases of sickness to one death, will account for much of the poverty and distress in New York. There is a close connection between poverty and ill health; suffering, sickness, and despondency are the direct results of defective systems of domestic life.

Emigration has done something to swell the total of city poor dependent upon charity; large numbers of these emigrants being the refuse of foreign countries, who, with neither trade nor profession, resort to begging, if to nothing worse, as a means of livelihood. But the great evil is the centripetal power exercised by a place like New York over the unemployed poor in the country and in other towns; they fly thither, fondly but vainly supposing that there must be so many facilities for living in the great city. Besides, the more uniform conduct of the various county poor officers in making things generally uncomfortable for tramps and that class of vagrants, has a tendency to propel these persons into the city, where no labor test exists, and where an idle man finds it only too easy to get food enough for the asking.

Some scale of pauperism, however, must be adopted by us. Shall it be three to five per cent of the population, or thirty to fifty per

and

cent? The present method of dealing with it feeds the very evil which we want to destroy. It surely must be a mistake to feel and think and act as if the poor were always going to remain poor, yet this is the summary of out-door relief as administered at present in New York City. Much, however, may be done in the way of improving the present practice by acting on some recognized principles. Among these are,

I. The continuance and development of the feeling of cordial reliance and mutual support between public and private modes of administering relief, — between the official and the volunteer systems.

II. Where city or state funds are allowed from any source in aid of charitable institutions, they should be confined to those thoroughly established and recognized, not used to stimulate new enterprises. The State Board of Charities in such matters should have full advisory powers.

III. No application for incorporation by a charitable institution should be considered (indeed, no appeal to the public for aid by any new organization should be allowed) until it has been approved by the State Board of Charities. This would act as a check on the undue multiplication of charities with the same object.

IV. It would be most desirable to re-organize the city for charitable purposes, combining the representatives of all existing societies whether national or benevolent, religious or medical engaged in the out-door relief of the poor; and adopting from the experience of this and other countries, the best and wisest forms of systematic visiting and relief.

But after all, whatever plans may be suggested, the first and the last requirement is co-operation, co-operation among the departments of the city government, co-operation between these departments and the charitable societies, and co-operation among the societies themselves. Without such co-operation but little will be gained in the contest with the forces of experienced and crafty pauperism with it the walls of Jericho will fall down.

DEBATE ON OUT-DOOR RELIEF.

At the close of Mr. Pellew's Paper, which was read by Rev. A. G. Byers, one of the Secretaries of the Conference, the three papers above presented were debated together. The debate was opened by Mr. F. B. Sanborn of Massachusetts who said :

MR. SANBORN. -The general subject assigned to the Standing

Committee on " Medical Charities and Out-Door Relief” has been ably treated in the three papers read to-day, that by Dr. Wheelwright, who discussed both branches of the question as it occurs in Massachusetts; that by Dr. Taylor, who has given us the condition of things in Cincinnati; and, finally the paper of Mr. Pellew, which, while setting forth, more clearly than I have ever seen done before, the administration of out-door relief in New York city, has also considered the general question of how this form of charity, including medical charity, ought to be managed. I shall leave to others the discussion of the two last papers, and confine myself mainly to the question of out-door relief in Massachusetts, treated in Dr. Wheelwright's paper. Concerning this, my connection with the Massachusetts Board of Charities, for twelve years, has given me some information and experience.

I think I may say, confidently, that there is no serious abuse of out-door relief in the rural towns of my State; such evils as exist are found in the cities and largest towns, of which we have about twenty-five, 19 of them chartered cities. The other 32 towns are free from any considerable abuse of out-door relief, and even in the cities it is only now and then that extravagance takes place and serious mischief is done. I agree with Dr. Wheelwright that a well-administered, strictly supervised system of out-door relief is better in many respects than indoor-relief. On this point I may refer to some facts and views set forth by me in an article on Pauperism in the American Cyclopædia, and a communication to the Michigan Convention of Superintendents of the Poor, held in Grand Rapids last winter. An abuse of out-door relief almost always arises from inadequate knowledge by the relieving officer of the circumstances of the applicant; and this, from the nature of the case, is more likely to occur in a city than in a rural district. Favoritism also occurs in cities; but the great trouble there is a negligent administration of public charity.

There are certain abuses in the Massachusetts cities, but they are rather fitful and transitory than permanent. This subject has the same laws as any merchant's business. If he has a large business of any kind, and he chooses to go to Europe or anywhere else and leave his affairs wholly in the hands of a person not interested like himself, the business is sure to suffer. The reason there are abuses in large cities is, the officials don't pay the proper attention to their business. But this neglect is found out in a short time, and remedied. There was a very striking illustration of that in

the city of Cambridge, near Boston, with a population now about 50,000; a city that has always been liberal in giving out-door relief. A few years ago an excellent man was chosen mayor, who knew nothing about public charity, but was extremely anxious to be re-elected, and he took the necessary temporal means to secure that election, by allowing persons to get official positions which they never should have had. In consequence of this, the pauper expense ran up in two years from $40,000 to more than $80,000. There was a proper cause for some increase, I suppose under the most frugal administration the $40,000 would have increased to $50,000, - but it is safe to say that $30,000 was thrown away. About one half of this was for in-door, and the other half for out-door relief. The citizens discovered this state of things, and a year ago last December they turned this mayor out and put in a new man, who immediately set to work remedying the evils that existed in the different departments of the city government. He found out and turned out thieves and defaulters, and persons who spent their time smoking cigars and drawing their salaries. The result has been that in these last two winters - which are generally considered the worst for the poor we have ever had in Massachusetts- the city of Cambridge has got back to its former annual expenditure of from $40,000 to $50,000. And that is the case with most of the New England cities which err in this way for a few years; they soon recover themselves. I can, however, easily understand that, in a very large city, an abuse of this kind may become inveterate, as seems to be in the case in New York.

GEN. BRINkerhoff. There are several matters to which I desire briefly to refer. I had occasion, two or three years since, officially, through appointment of the Court of Common Pleas, to examine the accounts of the infirmary directors of my county, and found, among other things, an apparent extravagance in the items for out-door relief. Compared with similar items for in-door relief, they were often double, and sometimes even larger. This was especially the case in bills for medical services.

I can very well understand how, under the New-England system, these abuses cannot occur. There the State is divided into towns, and each town taxes itself; but here the out-door relief is made under the supervision of what we call Township Trustees. The medical aid is furnished by the country doctors, and medicines and other supplies are purchased at the country stores, and the bills are