remarkable, the bill had been suffered to pass through all its stages in the commons without any objection being made to this essential part; although Mr. Canning and others had given notice of an opposition, and were present at all the debates upon it. The alteration was reserved for the upper house, where one of the ministers proposed it, and none of his colleagues objected.

The objects of the bill were as materially limited, as the powers of the commissioners had been crippled.

First, they were prohibited from inquiring generally into the state of education, although a great saving both of time and expense to the public would have been effected by allowing them to make that inquiry when they visited any district for other purposes.

Secondly, they were no longer to examine abuses of all charities, but only of those connected with the education of the poor. A most unfortunate change in the constitution of the board-for every one was aware how many malversations existed in charitable institutions wholly unconnected with education, and it was obviously a more natural, as well as more economical course of proceeding, to authorise the commissioners to look into these at the same time that they were examining the others, than to send one set of functionaries to investigate school charities, and then dispatch a second body to go over the same ground, in order to see what the former had been ordered to overlook.

The instruction under which the committee acted, confined its inquiries to charities connected with education. Nevertheless, we had accidently been made acquainted with abuses of a very gross description in other charities, which the powers of the commission, as now restricted, cannot reach. We found that one corporation in Hampshire, entrusted with the management of estates worth above 2000l. a-year for the use of the poor, let them for 2 or 3007. on fines, and would give no account of the manner in which those fines were applied. The same body, it was stated, employed a sum of money confided to it for charitable purposes, in payment of its own debts. At Mere, in Lincolnshire, is an endowment for a warden and poor brethren of a very ancient date. The warden and his lessees seem to be well provided for, whatever may be the lot of the brethren; the estate consists of 650 acres, five miles from Lincoln; it is let for only half-a-guinea an acre, though it pays neither tythe nor poor's rate; and 247. ayear is the whole sum allotted to the poor brethren. The bishop of the diocese is both patron and visitor; he has given the wardenship to his nephew; and the former warden resigned it upon being promoted by the same prelate to a living in his gift. The

son of that right reverend person is master of Spital Hospital in the same county. Besides other landed property, he is in possession of one estate worth 6 or 7001. a-year in right of his office; and all that he pays to the poor is 271. 4s. to four or five pensioners. At Wellingborough, in Northamptonshire, there are lands belonging to different charities, of which only one is connected with education; a short time ago they were let for 687., although worth near 1100l.; and the trustees at one period enjoyed the leases. In the parish of Yeovil in Somersetshire, there are estates possessed by trustees, and destined to four different charities, one only of which is a school. Limited as the commissioners now are, they may examine those trustees as to one part of their trust; but they must order them to be silent as to the other three. They may inspect the deeds and accounts relating to the school revenue, but they must suddenly shut the book when they perceive any mention of the other charities. And yet all the four seem to have been equally abused. An estate worth 7007. a-year

only educates seven or eight boys; lands valued at 11 or 1200l. a year only afford a wretched pittance to sixteen paupers; and property worth 150l. a-year is let for 21. 1s. 4d. chiefly to the trustees themselves. There are two estates belonging to the poor of Croydon, which ought to bring between 1000 and 1500l. a-year, and yet are worth nothing from being badly let on 90 years' leases; but into this the commissioners must not look, when they go to examine the abuses in the hospital, because those estates are unconnected with education. In that hospital itself, they will find but little within their jurisdiction; it is, indeed, full of abuse, but only a small portion of the charity belongs to the school, and even that is protected from inquiry by the appointment of a visitor-which leads me to the next head of exemption.

Thirdly, among charities connected with education, there was introduced a large class of exceptions, comprehending, not only the universities and the public schools down to Rugby, but generally all charities having special" visitors, governors or overseers." Now it happens, that almost every considerable charity is subject to special visitation; consequently what remains for the operations of the commissioners lies within a sufficiently narrow compass.

This last alteration of the bill, we justly viewed as a matter of extreme regret. For of the many instances of gross abuse, which had come to our knowledge, and some of which will be seen in the evidence now made public, there was hardly one which this clause did not withdraw from the jurisdiction of the commissioners. Thus Pocklington school, with a large revenue, had been suffered to fall into decay, so that only one boy was taught,

and the room converted into a saw-pit; yet it has visitors, (St. John's College, Cambridge,) who, probably from ignorance of the evil, had taken no step to correct it before last winter. So, the property of the Huntingdon school is grossly misapplied; the land is let to accommodate the trustees, and is made the means of supporting a political interest in that borough; yet the charity has visitors in the persons of some of those very trustees, who are thus by the exemption in the act, secured against all inquiry. It should seem too, that St. Bees school is equally exempted. But that its affairs merit investigation clearly appears by the evidence; for we there find that leases of its land were granted at a remote period, for 1000 years, at a very low fixed rent; that at a more recent date, the valuable minerals were leased at a mere trifle (37. 14s.) for the term of 8 or 900 years, to one of the trustees; that one of the present trustees now enjoys the lease; and that a decided majority of the others are clergymen, holding livings under him, and supporting him in his management of the concern. As none of them has made any attempt to set aside a lease which every one must perceive to be utterly void, and as one of their number has expressed his apprehensions of engaging in a contest with so powerful an adversary, it may be presumed that such considerations alone could deter them from performing what was obviously their duty to the charity; and the inference is irresistible, that this was exactly a case which demanded the interposition of the commissioners. Certain estates devised for the purposes of education at Reading, appear to have been let as late as 1811, for nearly the same rent that they fetched in Charles the Second's reign. It is now considerably raised; but some of the lands seem still to be much underlet; at any rate an inquiry would be highly beneficial where such negligence appears so recently to have prevailed: yet all examination is precluded by the proviso; for there is a special visitor. The hospital at Croydon, founded by Archbishop Whitgift, is protected from investigation by a similar appointment; but the evidence plainly shows, that all is not right there. The estates are valued by the surveyor of the house itself at 2,6731. a-year; yet they are let for 8601.; and down to 1812, they fetched no more than 336. A free school too, is specially appointed to be kept for all the inha

An attempt was made to deny this; but it seems to be the result of the evidence taken together. At any rate, it is admitted, that the proper school-room was wholly disused, except for keeping lumber and working

materials.

2. The rent is about 100%., the value of the tenements being above 8000%.

a-year.

bitants of Croydon; but none has within the memory of man been taught, although the master receives his emoluments, teaching another school for his own profit, and although the inhabitants have established a seminary upon the new plan, to give education at their own expense to the poor of the place, in the very schoolroom which Archbishop Whitgift devised for their gratuitous instruction. These abuses, I verily believe, are unknown to the distinguished prelate who is visitor of the hospital. Whoever fills his station in the church, has, beside the ordinary functions of his province, the superintendence of a vast number of charitable institutions in various parts of the kingdom; and it is quite impossible that his eye should be always fixed upon the abuses which silently creep into each. Until they are denounced to him, he must of necessity be ignorant of their existence, and the office of accuser is a thankless one at the best. The visitatorial power is only put in motion at stated periods; and even then, if no one comes forward to complain, credit is naturally given to the members of the corporation for doing their duty and obeying the statutes. But on the other hand, the assistance of such a body as the commissioners in supplying the want of accusers, and in discovering latent abuses, is precisely that which a conscientious visitor would desire. He can feel no jealousy of any encroachment upon his rights, for these remain as before; the only difference is, that he has now to exercise his office with a more perfect knowledge of the matters within his jurisdiction, the inquiries of the commissioners having brought to his notice all the points to which his superintending power should be directed for the purposes of reformation. I think we have a right to assume that the Archbishop of Canterbury viewed the bill in this, its true light, from the very liberal and candid support which his grace was pleased to give it.

Nothing, indeed, can be more groundless than the jealousy which appears to have been raised by it in other quarters. In what respect could the proceedings of the commissioners interfere with any person's functions, whether as trustee or as visitor? They were only empowered to inquire and to report; to discover abuses, and to lay them before parliament and the country. Here their authority ended; they could make no order whatever for correcting the mismanagement which they detected, were it ever so glaring. To search for the evil, and expose it to the light, was their whole office; the remedy was reserved for parliament, if it required legislative interference; but in the first instance, it was left to the parties themselves, whose conduct had been investigated, and if they failed to amend their ways, the visitors were unquestionably entitled to interpose as if the act had never passed.

To

describe the commissioners as coming into conflict with the visitors, was a gross misrepresentation of the powers and functions of both. Yet it was entirely upon this misrepresentation, that the, clause exempting charities specially visited was built. The pretext that it was authorised by the example of the statute of Elizabeth, is utterly unfounded. The commissioners of charitable uses, under that act, have powers which would interfere directly with those of special visitors; for they are not merely to investigate, but to make orders and decrees; they are in fact to sit as a court, and they are entitled to try issues of fact by a jury. The clause exempting charities specially visited from their jurisdiction, was therefore necessary to preserve the visitatorial power according to the founder's intentions. But what founder ever dreamt of preventing any inquiry from being made into the state of his charity? What founder could, were he alive to see it, be otherwise than gratified by an investigation, the result of which can have no possible tendency but that of enabling the visitor appointed by himself to exercise with full effect, the powers of superintendence conferred by him for the express purpose of correcting all abuses in the trusts created by his foundation?

I have mentioned a few instances of abuses brought to light by the labors of the committee, all growing up to maturity in charities which have special visitors, and which the commissioners are bound to overlook by virtue of the exemptions introduced into the bill. It may perhaps be thought that these have been already examined, and that our report, with respect to them at least, will be sufficient to produce a speedy reform. But I cannot quite indulge in this hope. We had not the means of sifting those cases to the bottom: we plainly perceived that much remained to be investigated in each. Thus, the sums to be refunded by the Yeovil trustees severally, we had no means of tracing. We were equally unable to ascertain how much in value of the St. Bees school property remained in the hands of the noble lord, who sustains in his own person the double character of trustee and lessee. It was in like manner impossible to estimate the arrears due to the poor from the worthy magistrates of Huntingdon, and the noble family whose political interest in that borough has been founded upon the misapplication of the charity estates. Nor did we see, in the past conduct of any of those parties, the slightest reason to expect that the publication of our report would of itself have the immediate effect of restoring the poor to their rights. On the contrary, an extraordinary pertinacity had been evinced by them all, in defence of their actual possessions, and in resisting every investigation of their titles.

Besides, there is every reason to believe that abuses of a similar