5. That those arrested and sent thither as beggars should not be set free until, 1st., they had repaid all expenses; and 2ndly, had fitted themselves to earn an independent livelihood, or been demanded by their commune or relatives, and security given for their future conduct.
6. That in each house there should be an ecclesiastic to perform divine service, and give moral and religious instruction, frequently in private, and twice a week in public; and that, where the inmates should consist of Protestants and Catholics, there should be both a Catholic and a Protestant ecclesiastic.
7. That in each house there should be a daily school for the young, and a school for the adult, open for four hours on Sundays, and for an hour two evenings of the week. The attendance on these schools to be compulsory.
8. That so far as the confined paupers did not earn their own subsistence, each commune should pay for the support of those having in it their domicile de secours, at the above-mentioned rate of 17 cents. (3½d.) per day, but be allowed a discount of 2 cents. per day (reducing the daily payment to 3d.) on prompt payment.
A decree of the 9th April, 1831, by the Regent, abolished that discount, the sum of 3d. a day having been found insufficient, except in the depôt of Bruges, in which the decree states that it covers every expense.
The existing Government has passed two very important laws, dated the 13th & 29th of August, 1833.
The first of these enacts, that until the laws on mendicity shall have been revised, the daily charge for the subsistence of each detenu in the depôt de mendicité, instead of being fixed at 17 cents., shall be determined annually by the Government. The commune bound to repay the expense is to be assisted, if incapable of meeting it, by the province, the King deciding if the matter is disputed. If payment is not made, a personal remedy is given against the receiver of the commune.
By the second, a conseil d’inspection des depôts de mendicité is to be elected in each province. Each conseil is to propose a scheme,—
1. For dividing the inmates of the depôts into three classes, comprising, 1st, the infirm; 2d, the able-bodied who have voluntarily entered them; 3d, those sentenced to them as beggars or vagrants.
2. For obviating the abuses which might follow from the power given to the indigent of voluntarily entering the depôts.