responsible office he fills, and the chaplain, practically manage the institution with marked ability.*

The Middlesex Industrial School, when established in 1859, under a Local Act, 17 and 18 Vict., c. 169, was in effect meant to be a prison for the vagrant boys of Middlesex, especially of London, who had been convicted of crime rather than for the purpose of a school; but the number of convicted boys now consists of only one-seventh of the whole, the remaining six-sevenths being youths sent under the power of the Industrial Schools Act, which provides for detention without conviction, while a large proportion of the present inmates are simply truant children sent at the instance of the London School Board, because their parents cannot control them and make them go to school. Consequently, the institution is no longer a prison, but a reformatory and compulsory school as is shown by the fact that its inmates, though allowed great freedom in their movements, seldom desert-I might say almost never except when enticed away by, or through the instrumentality of, their depraved parents or others. The boys are received at the age of ten, and maintained until they are sixteen, but not later;† they have then learned some branch of trade and are fit to do for themselves.

Perhaps in no part of the world can there be found a more depraved class of boys-"street Arabs," as they have been appropriately called-than in the city of London. The Feltham Institution may, therefore, be said to receive, shelter, train and educate the very dregs

* See Annual Report of the Committee of Visitors of the Industrial School at Feltham, 1876.

See Parliamentary Paper, "Training-Ships," ordered, on the motion of Captain Bedford Pim, R.N., to be printed 24th July, 1876.

The following table, from the Report of the Committee, shows the number of boys instructed in trades, &c., during the year ending 31st December, 1875 :

of society, most of whom would soon be irretrievably steeped in crime, were they not thus saved from ruin and from becoming a nuisance to society. It would be difficult to find anywhere else human nature at so low an ebb, morally, socially, and physically, as a large number of these homeless waifs present when first admitted to the Feltham Institution; yet mark the results-they are satisfactory in the extreme. During the three years, 1872 to 1874, inclusive, for which the last returns have been made up, there were 821 boys discharged and provided for,* of whom 82.5 per cent. are doing well, 8 per cent. dead, doubtful, and unascertained, and 9.5 per cent. have been convicted of crime, and these in the majority of

cases from the 165 who were "placed under the care of friends." Out of the 285 who entered the Navy and Merchant Service, 85.9 per cent. are known to be doing well, and 61.4 per cent. are still following the sea.*

Although I do not pretend to say that all the boys in Feltham School, who are training for the sea, are the best that could be obtained for the purposes of the Royal Navy, they should not be altogether ignored as they now are; and therefore I hope, before there is any further legislation on the question of manning the Navy, the First Lord of the Admiralty himself, with the First Sea-Lord, will visit that institution and judge for themselves as to the qualities of the youths and, of their fitness, in time, to enrol them to aid in fighting our battles. If my Lords can only be convinced of that fact, as I have been, they may render a two-fold service to their country of no ordinary importance, both as regards the social question and the means of efficiently manning our ships of war in the hour of need. There are 128,000 boys (about an equal number of girls) receiving either indoor or outdoor relief from the various parishes and unions of this country; † and I see no reason why a considerable portion of these boys, or as many of them as we require, should not be made subservient to the purposes of the Royal Navy and Mercantile Marine.

It is true, especially in the case of the Feltham School, that many of the boys in that institution do not meet the

*If the system of "apprenticeship" was adopted for that of "boys," the percentage under the head of "following the sea" would be far in excess of 61.4, for, as it is now, a boy is free at the end of a voyage, and, returning home to his friends, is often persuaded to follow some other calling, and thus the expense of his special training is lost to the country.

See an excellent pamphlet on "Training-Ships and TrainingSchools," by Edmund E. Antrobus, Esq., who was chairman of the Feltham Industrial Schools, and who has given much attention to this subject. London: Stanton and Son, Strand. 1875.

physical requirements of the Admiralty; but why those who do should not be received, now that it has been shown how little there is to fear from their conduct, I am at a loss to understand, except that the Admiralty has not made itself sufficiently conversant with the present state of this truly important question.

Considering how these destitute boys have been brought up, the majority of them having no home, sleeping in the parks or on door-steps, or under arches or by brickkilns, and seeking the means of existence by begging or picking up what they can get in the streets, gutters, and common sewers, they are, as might be supposed, when admitted, in too many instances, a miserable-looking lot. But it is astonishing how they fill out when they have wholesome food, healthy work, and proper places of rest. They may not all, at the limited age of 16, fulfil the requirements in height and breadth of the Admiralty, but there is every reason to suppose that if they continue to be well fed and cared for, they will in time make active and valuable seamen, unless they are diseased or there is about them some inherent weakness. I have seen many of the youths who were brought up at Feltham after they reached manhood, and I could not desire to see a more cleanly, active, muscular and respectable-looking class of young men, especially those who have continued to follow seafaring or other out-door pursuits. We do not require for the Royal Navy nor for the Merchant Service overgrown Herculean men, such as the Yorkshire naavies. What we want is intelligent, active, wiry fellows, who could creep into the muzzle of a gun if needs be, or unfurl the British ensign from the truck; and these are to be found from the sources I have named. Anything beyond 5ft. 7 in. in height, or 12 stone in weight, only tends to make the sailor less agile, and therefore less useful on board ship. Above 16 stone, men are worthless for working or fighting; heavy weights may carry the day in

railway excavations, or in charges at close quarters in a battle-field, but as a rule, they are in their persons an encumbrance at sea.

I have gone more into detail in regard to the Feltham institution than I should otherwise have done, were it not the case that the Admiralty have hitherto practically declined to receive from it boys into the Royal Navy, except a small number, 35 in all, during the years 1872-75, and these only because they had displayed a taste for music and were likely to become efficient bandsmen !! *

The truth is, the Lords of the Admiralty of to-day, as of old, are slow to change their established rules, and I fear do not sufficiently consider the progress made in our social position, nor the relative advantages of science, education, and activity as against bulk and weight.

* Although many young men who have been trained in Feltham School are now to be found serving in the Navy as seamen, none have been allowed to enter direct for the purpose of being trained as such, except 19 boys who were received in the years 1861-62, and, though without the special nautical training which the institution now affords, 16, or 84 per cent., of these 19 boys were reported as "doing well" at the end of the succeeding three years. It is difficult to understand, with such facts before us, why a standing order was introduced prohibiting the entry of boys from reformatories; any such order is contrary to, and is, indeed, a protest on the part of the Admiralty against the noble exertions of the nation, now being made to educate our destitute homeless children, and raise them,lif not from the pot-house to the parlour, to be industrious members of society.