The Royal Institution: Its Founder and First ProfessorsJones, Bence
History
The Royal Institution: Its Founder and First Professors
Jones, Bence
Davy, Humphry, Sir, 1778-1829; Royal Institution of Great Britain; Rumford, Benjamin, Graf von, 1753-1814; Young, Thomas, 1773-1829
New Year’s Day having been long specially set apart for giving alms
early that morning in 1790, three regiments of infantry, with their
officers, were stationed in the streets, and Sir B. Thompson assembled
the magistrates and asked their assistance to take up all the beggars
and to provide for the poor. Accompanied by the chief magistrate,
he went into the street, and the first beggar who asked for alms he
arrested with his own hands, and orders were given to all the other
officers, who also were accompanied with magistrates, to do the same.
In less than an hour no beggar was to be found in the streets. They
were taken to the Town Hall, inscribed in printed lists, and then told
to go to the newly-erected Military Workhouse. An address was opened to
the public, asking for perfectly voluntary subscriptions to put an end
to begging; monthly sums were given, and daily supplies of bread, meat,
and soup were collected.[3]
Several good spinners of hemp were engaged at the House of Industry,
and this was the first occupation of the poor. Knitting, sewing, and
carding wool were early occupations, but the object to be desired
was woollen work for the clothing of the army. If the poor did well,
they were rewarded; if they came late, their food was lessened. They
slept at their own homes, and when ill they received relief at home.
Everything was done to encourage industry and emulation. ‘To incite
activity and inspire with a true spirit of persevering industry, it was
necessary to fire the poor with emulation--to awaken in them a dormant
passion whose influence they had never felt; the love of honest fame;
an ardent desire to excel, the love of glory, or by what other pompous
name this passion, the most noble and most beneficent that warms the
human heart, can be distinguished.’[4]
To excite emulation praise, distinctions, rewards are necessary; and
these were all employed.
The House of Industry for the Poor and the Military Workhouse were
quite separate in their management, though they were so dependent on
each other that neither of them could subsist alone; one building
served for both.
Twice yearly small sums were given to the poor to assist them in paying
for lodgings, and ultimately a large house was bought and fitted up
as an hospital for those who were infirm and unable to take care of
themselves.
Means were adopted for giving relief to those who never were beggars,
but who, from poverty and inability to provide the necessaries of life,
were involved in distresses and difficulties which they bore in silence.
Persons of distinguished birth even sent to the House of Industry
at Munich for flax, or wool, or linen, which they manufactured into
goods, and received the usual amount of wages; and some who had been
accustomed to sumptuous fare took the soup furnished gratis from the
public kitchen to the poor.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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