Charities in London.—Taking the whole of London, and not exempting from the account such as may be correctly classed as metropolitan institutions, as Greenwich Hospital, &c., there are no less than 491 charitable institutions, exclusive of mere local endowments and trusts, parochial and local schools, &c. These charities comprise—12 general medical hospitals; 50 medical charities for special purposes; 35 general dispensaries; 12 societies and institutions for the preservation of life and public morals; 18 societies for reclaiming the fallen and staying the progress of crime; 14 societies for the relief of general destitution and distress; 12 societies for relief of specific descriptions of want; 14 societies for aiding the resources of the industrious (exclusive of loan funds and savings-banks); 11 societies for the deaf and dumb, and the blind; 103 colleges, hospitals, and institutions of almshouses for the aged; 16 charitable pension societies; 74 charitable and provident societies, chiefly for specified classes; 31 asylums for orphan and other necessitous children; 10 educational foundations; 4 charitable modern ditto; 40 school societies, religious books, church-aiding, and Christian visiting societies; 35 Bible and missionary societies; showing a total of 491 (which includes parent societies only, and is quite exclusive of the numerous “auxiliaries,” &c.). These charities annually disburse, in aid of their respective objects, the extraordinary amount of £1,764,736, of which upwards of £1,000,000 is raised annually by voluntary contributions; the remainder from funded property, sale of publications, &c.
Prison at Athens.—The following description of an Athenian prison is extracted from a letter of an American citizen, (Rev. Dr. Jonas King,) whose name is doubtless familiar to most of our readers as associated with a very extraordinary exercise of arbitrary power.
In the Prison of Athens, called Medrese, 9th March, 1852.
I am now in prison, and my name is inscribed among the vilest malefactors of Greece, in a book kept for the purpose, in which the names of all who enter are written, with the age, description of their person, and the crime of which they have been guilty. Mine is that of preaching the word of God. That of two others here in chains, is the murder of seventeen persons.
The prison is called Medrese, which is a Turkish word meaning school; and this is so called, because it was formerly used by the Turks as a school. Besides myself, there are one hundred and twenty-five persons. A few days since there were one hundred and eighty. These occupy eleven small rooms, eight of which are about ten or eleven feet square, in each of which are from eight to twelve persons. The other three rooms are perhaps two or three times as large, and in each are confined twenty-five persons. From these facts you can judge of the accommodations enjoyed here. Most of them have no beds on which to sleep, and some not very warmly clad. It is enough to make one’s heart ache to see them. The sight of them made me feel that my trials and troubles were small.—Decent looking men, and the vilest malefactors; men not yet tried, and who are perhaps innocent, and those who have already been condemned for piracy, rape, and murder; the youth who has committed perhaps his first crime, or no crime at all; and those who have grown old in iniquity, and whose consciences are seared as with a hot iron, are here crowded together in one common mass, from which proceeds an odor by no means agreeable, even now when the weather is cool, and which as the weather grows warm, must become intolerable. And just think of sleeping in a little room, about ten feet square, with ten or eleven others locked in with you for the night, and only a small window in the door for air, and one by the side of it for light, darkened by its thick heavy iron gates, and looking upon a small court within.
It is scarcely credible that a country so closely associated with the most enlightened kingdoms of Europe, as Greece, and a city so conversant with modern improvements in municipal economy as Athens, should be open to the reproach of such folly and cruelty, as this paragraph discloses.
DOMESTIC.
New York State Lunatic Asylum.—The annual report of this institution for the year 1851, furnishes the following facts: At the commencement of the year there were 429 patients in the asylum; 366 have been added, and 357 discharged during the year; of whom 112 were recovered, 15 much improved, 51 improved, 13 unimproved, and 45 died. The number in the asylum at the date of the report was 425, of whom 220 were males, and 215 females. Of those admitted during the year, the greatest number were between the ages of 25 and 30 years. Of the causes of derangement, the chief is stated to be intemperance, the number of patients from this cause now in the asylum being 44 males and 1 female.
Emigration.—The commissioners of emigration of New York, in a recent report to the legislature, state, that at the port of the city of New York alone, there arrived during the year 1851, 289,601, of whom there were natives of Ireland, 163,256; Germany, 69,883; other countries, 56,462; making an increase of 75,998 over the preceding year. The emigrants from Ireland exceed the whole number from other countries by 36,911. Of these, 85,000 were in a condition which required aid, being either sick or paupers.
It is stated in the public prints, (and we have seen no contradiction of it,) that a single Irish nobleman secured a passage to our shores of nineteen hundred persons, at the rate of £2 per head, and ten shillings on their arrival.
Boston City Marshal’s Report.—By the annual report of the marshal of the City of Boston, we learn that the whole number of robberies reported at the marshal’s office during the year 1851, was 562; amount of property lost and stolen, $44,418; amount of property recovered and restored to owners, $26,131. The whole number of complaints and arrests was 5,449, among which were, for larceny, 625; drunkenness, 1,465. Of the whole number of arrests made, 1,110 were minors. There have been 969 complaints made to the Grand Jury, growing out of the sale of intoxicating liquors; and fines, exclusive of costs, collected, amounting to $12,474; and 36 have been imprisoned in the House of Correction, for different periods, amounting in all to more than 10 years. The number who apply at the marshal’s office for charity is very large, and all who were really deserving have had their wants supplied by that department, from a fund which is the proceeds of stolen and unclaimed goods, an accurate account of which has been kept. “There is no greater imposition practised,” says the report, “than the system of begging and soliciting charity. We have now in the office a large number of written and printed papers which have been taken from these impostors; and from one person we took twenty-one.”
Health of the Boston Farm School.—The following remarkable statement respecting the health and the mortality of the boys connected with the Farm School, on Thompson’s Island, in Boston harbor, is made on the authority of Robert Morrison, Esq., the Superintendent.
The number of boys in the school, June 1, 1851, was 85; January 1, 1850, 89; January 1, 1851, 97. The present number is 94, several having been recently sent to places in the country. No death has occurred on the island since August, 1845; which is the only time when a physician has been sent for on account of sickness among the boys, for nearly ten years!
Under Providence, we consider this, in some measure, owing to a healthy location, a simple but wholesome diet, exercise in the open air, and good ventilation.
The average number of boys in the school, for several years, has not been far from 80.
Boston Pauperism.—The Annual Report of the Boston Society for the Prevention of Pauperism, estimates the cost of pauperism to that city, in 1840, at $43,454; in 1845, $45,000; and in 1850, $111,905! It also states that in the past five years, the native American paupers have decreased about 37 per cent., while foreign paupers, supported by the city, have increased about 150 per cent.
Maine State Prison.—When the State of Maine was about to erect a new Penitentiary a few years ago, the commissioners were disposed to recommend the separate system as decidedly preferable on every ground, except that it costs more at first, and may not yield so large a profit on convict labor. By the last report of the commissioners, we observe that of the whole number of convicts, (eighty-four,) about one-half are employed in making shoes—a business quite as profitably pursued in seclusion as in association. Basket-making furnishes employment to such as, from age or infirmity, are unable to perform hard labor, and this also might be as well done in a cell. As to the finances of the institution, a special committee of the legislature, appointed to investigate its affairs says, “they cannot give any definite information,” but they portentously intimate, (what time will probably reveal,) that if revenue is a prominent object in the management of the prison, it will be defeated. “For any losses which may accrue to the State,” say the commissioners, “we attach no blame to any former warden or officer of the prison, for any neglect or want of care, but believe, the loss arises from the universal credit system which has been too prevalent in our State.” “We certainly hope so,” says a leading newspaper, “for it is high time the State were realizing more from the prison economy than it has yet done.”