No minister, unless with the permission of the parish, ought to announce from the pulpit the intended marriage of one whom he knows to be in the receipt of relief. If children, in consequence of the idleness, debauchery, gambling, or voluntary desertion of their father, become chargeable to the parish, and it is alleged that the father if he had been industrious and frugal could have supported them, the overseers may bring an action against him for the amount of the relief which has been afforded to his children; and if he do not pay he may be suspended from the exercise of all civil rights and claims as a bourgeois, _or be sentenced to not exceeding two years’ imprisonment in a house of correction_. A second offence is to be more severely punished. A mother wilfully abandoning her children shall be taken back to her parish and there kept to work. If she refuse, or attempt to escape, she may, on the requisition of her parish, and subject to an appeal to the Council of State, be sentenced to not exceeding three years’ imprisonment in a house of correction. Women who have had several bastards chargeable to the parish may, on the requisition of their parishes, be similarly punished. No one receiving, or who has received, parochial assistance, either on his own account or on that of his children can, unless specially authorized so to do by his parish, be present at parochial meetings, until he has repaid all the sums advanced to him. If any person entitled to parochial relief shall be refused, or insufficiently relieved, he may complain to the Prefect, who shall thereupon hear the allegations of the parish, and ascertain the condition of the complainant, with the assistance, if he has any doubt as to the existence or degree of his bodily infirmities, of a physician. The Prefect may then order such relief as may appear to him necessary, but no part of it is to be given in money. It appears, however, to have been unsuccessful; for 12 years after, the government, after having in vain offered rewards for good advice on the subject (p. 225), by an ordonnance dated the 14th April, 1819, absolutely forbade the levying of rates higher than the average of those of the years 1813, 1814, and 1815. The failure of so coarse a remedy might have been predicted, and accordingly we find the present state of the country thus described in the official report (p. 214):-- It is evident that, with respect to pauperism, the present situation of the Canton de Berne is in the highest degree painful. The evil is not temporary or partial: it arises from no external or accidental sources: a considerable portion of the population is attacked by it, and it is spreading itself, like a moral blight, over the whole community.