It is interesting at this point to sum up the policy of the Central Authority, so far as embodied in its published documents between 1834 and 1847, with regard to outdoor relief to women, especially as affecting the "Rate in Aid of Wages." The policy differed fundamentally in the two different areas of the country governed respectively by the two kinds of Orders. Where the Outdoor Labour Test Order (continued, after 1852, by the Outdoor Relief Regulation Order, which is still in force) was alone applied, the discretion of the local authority to give outdoor relief to women of any status, married or unmarried, with children or without, was unfettered by any Order. The only rule made by the Central Authority in the matter was that if the woman was the wife of an able-bodied man who was himself employed on "parish work," and residing with him, at least one-half of his relief should be in kind. No rule was made or Order issued by the Central Authority against the grant of outdoor relief to women employed for wages, even in respect of the very days on which they were earning wages. We have mentioned that the Central Authority, so far as men were concerned, stood rigidly to the position of the 1834 Report that the moral character of the applicant was to be absolutely disregarded in considering the relief to be granted to him. With regard to women, however, it took up a different position. We find it advising that the mothers of illegitimate children should, on this ground alone, not be granted outdoor relief.[152] [152] Poor Law Commissioners to Plymouth Court of Guardians, 25th April 1840. Where the Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Order was in force, neither spinsters nor wives residing with able-bodied husbands[153] could, apart from sudden and urgent necessity, receive outdoor relief, unless they were sick. But with regard to widows and wives living apart from their husbands, the exceptions to the prohibition were so numerous that both these classes may almost be said to have been expressly allowed to receive outdoor relief. The fact that such women were in employment for wages was not regarded by the Orders of the Central Authority as relevant: nor was it prescribed that any task of labour should be exacted in return for the relief. And although if we look closely, it is possible to find, in the circulars, instructional letters and published decisions of these thirteen years (1834-1847), two or three bare incidental allusions to the possibility of outdoor relief to women having the effect of a "Rate in Aid of Wages," even these occur only in the earlier years, and presently die away entirely. It is, therefore, not incorrect to say that an objection to outdoor relief to women in employment formed during these years no part of the declared policy of the Central Authority. [153] Not being soldiers, sailors, or marines.