pair of boots. The difficulty of testing his statement is insuperable. There can only be one result—he gets the boots. In this manner the granting both of clothes and passes soon assumes very large proportions. That this in some cases—it may possibly be in very few cases—constitutes an "attraction" of the workhouse, is clear from the following authentic dialogues:—
A young and lusty tramp appears before the Committee.
Chairman.—"Well, what brings you in here?"
Tramp.—"A pair of boots."
A well-known character who has been passed to another Union turns up again.
Chairman.—" What! You here again? You know you have rendered yourself liable to prosecution. I should like to know what you have to say for yourself."
Well-known Character.—"Well, I hadn't got no trousers to go out in: that partly brought me in."
Another habitué does not even wait to be questioned, but begins at once—"I came in for a pair of trousers this time."
The wholesale giving away of clothes has long since been abandoned in the workhouse in question. There are many reasons why a Committee of Examination soon becomes popular, in spite of the fact that a great number of those who come before it receive "severe reprimands" from the chairman. Severe reprimands, however, when repeated possibly for the twentieth time to the same inmate, are apt to lose their force, and even a chairman's resources of language are not inexhaustible. Meanwhile, there are many who appear to delight in their weekly appearance before the Guardians. Some desire to give them a bit of their mind. "If it wasn't for the likes of us, I should like to know where the likes of you would be?" said a promis-
