guide its proceedings, would be borne down by clamour, or wearied by lengthened discussion, if not finally compelled to abandon their post.” It was no easy matter to have brought this great work of a statutable poor relief to its present advanced state, without exciting stronger feelings of opposing party than any which fortunately have yet been elicited; but it may well be doubted if things would go on in the same quiet and businesslike manner if Guardian meetings were to be open to the public; and if there be any evil connected with the exclusion complained of, we may safely conjecture, at least, that it is the lesser of two--less than that which would arise from the jarrings and discord of party on a subject which, above any other, calls for unanimity, and should awaken only the feelings of a common benevolence and patriotism. We may now advert, in the last place, to the ameliorations in our social condition which may be expected to arise when the new system shall have been put fully in operation. In the first place, a reproach will be wiped away from our country, which certainly existed against it so long as it could be said that no law existed in it for the relief of the poor. Destitution will then be provided for, and mendicancy will be without excuse. It is true that there is no direct provision in the act for the restraint of beggary, but a legalised provision for the destitute is indirectly a law against it, and must operate most powerfully as such. When people are taxed to maintain the poor, they naturally become unwilling to open their purse-strings, unless with great reluctance, at the solicitation of mendicants; the trade of mendicancy declines; and those who would still cling to it are forced, if of the class of the able-bodied, to apply themselves to some means of profitable industry, or to resort to the workhouse for subsistence. The Poor-Relief Act is thus, indirectly, a law against mendicancy, and in this point of view is calculated to work most beneficially, and greatly to alter the face of things in Ireland. But it is also a law of positive economy to the country. The support of the destitute not being abandoned to casual charity, but conducted systematically by persons appointed to bestow their exclusive attention to it, and all rateable parties being under a legal obligation to contribute in due proportion to their circumstances, there cannot be a doubt that a less expenditure will suffice under such management for the maintenance of the really destitute than if the work were left to mere voluntary benevolence, and no means existed of compelling all classes fairly to share the burden among them.