perhaps his enemies would not allow him. The Dean concluded with acknowledging to have expressed his wishes, that an inscription might have been graven on the box, showing some reason why the city thought fit to do him that honour, which was much out of the common forms to a person in a private station; those distinctions being usually made only to chief governors, or persons in very high employments. D. S. A PROPOSAL FOR GIVING BADGES TO THE BEGGARS IN ALL THE April 22, 1737. It has been a general complaint, that the poor house (especially since the new constitution by act of parliament) has been of no benefit to this city, for the ease of which it was wholly intended. I had the honour to be a member of it many years before it was new modelled by the legislature; not from any personal regard, but merely as one of the two deans, who are of course put into most commissions that relate to the city; and I have likewise the honour to have been left out of several commissions upon the score of party, in which my predecessors, time out of mind, have always been members. The first commission was made up of about fifty persons, which were, the lord mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs, and some few other citizens; the judges, the two archbishops, the two deans of the city, and oue or two more gentlemen. And I must confess my opinion, that the dissolving of the old commission, and establishing a new one of near three times the number, have been the great cause of rendering so good a design not only useless, but a grievance instead of a benefit to the city. In the pre * See, in vol. XII. p. 281, a former proposal to the same effect. N. sent commission all the city day ar ortutes. a great number of squires: At the few genera medier. Tar since the new estabismer. done except one ar 20 as 1 then thought might wa have found the CT Í tle wrangles about matter at meal and smal te sometimes here li momen: 1 general board Fe and early Bez 30 conside to have teen ira the cx Tee T cleaig Le s vagrants, we Il mendicants ir charity: as icient to give or follow their hospital; and vere such who ed what they The revenues, nt, are wholly rge upon any nothing could isapply those rom the coun e are at. ned with poor, of those poor le themselves gs, and from of which they nuisance, beieves, drunkbe rooted out vy a vast an A PROPOSAL FOR GIVING BADGES TO THE BEGGARS IN ALL THE April 22, 1737. IT has been a general complaint, that the poor house (especially since the new constitution by act of parliament) has been of no benefit to this city, for the ease of which it was wholly intended. I had the honour to be a member of it many years before it was new modelled by the legislature; not from any personal regard, but merely as one of the two deans, who are of course put into most commissions that relate to the city; and I have likewise the honour to have been left out of several commissions upon the score of party, in which my predecessors, time out of mind, have always been members. The first commission was made up of about fifty persons, which were, the lord mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs, and some few other citizens; the judges, the two archbishops, the two deans of the city, and one or two more gentlemen. And I must confess my opinion, that the dissolving of the old commission, and establishing a new one of near three times the number, have been the great cause of rendering so good a design not only useless, but a grievance instead of a benefit to the city. In the pre * See, in vol. XII. p. 281, a former proposal to the same effect. N. " sent commission all the city clergy are included, beside a great number of squires; not only those who reside in Dublin and the neighbourhood, but several who live at a great distance, and cannot possibly have the least concern for the advantage of the city. At the few general meetings, that I have attended since the new establishment, I observed very little was done except one or two acts of extreme justice, which I then thought might as well have been spared; and I have found the court of assistants usually taken up in little wrangles about coachmen, and adjusting accounts of meal and small beer; which, however necessary, might sometimes have given place to matters of much greater moment; I mean some schemes recommended to the general board for answering the chief ends in erecting and establishing such a poor house, and endowing it with so considerable a revenue; and the principal end I take to have been that of maintaining the poor and orphans of the city, where the parishes are not able to do it; and clearing the streets from all strollers, foreigners, and ⚫ sturdy beggars, with which, to the universal complaint and admiration, Dublin is more infested since the establishment of the poor-house, than it was ever known to be since its first erection. As the whole fund for supporting this hospital is raised only from the inhabitants of the city; so there can be hardly any thing more absurd than to see it misemployed in maintaining foreign beggars, and bastards, or orphans of farmers, whose country landlords never contributed one shilling toward their support. I would engage, that half this revenue, if employed with common care, and no very great degree of common honesty, would maintain all the real objects of charity in this city, except a small number of original poor in every parish, who might, |