might be learned, common sense alone excepted, the peculiar and rarest
gift of Providence. These three teachers were, _Necessity_, _Habit_, and
_Time_. At his starting in life, _Necessity_ had told him, that if he
hoped to _live_ he must _labour_; _Habit_ had turned the labour into an
_indulgence_; and _Time_ gave every man an hour for every thing, unless
he chose to yawn it away."--_Salathiel._

* * * * *


IRISH POOR.


The poor of England have suffered much and deeply from the change made
in the administration of the poor laws in 1795; but of late years they
have suffered still more from the influx of Irish paupers. Great Britain
has been overrun by half-famished hordes, that have, by their
competition, lessened the wages of labour, and by their example,
degraded the habits, and lowered the opinions of the people with respect
to subsistence. The facilities of conveyance afforded by
steam-navigation are such, that the merest beggar, provided he can
command a sixpence, may get himself carried from Ireland to England. And
when such is the fact--when what may almost without a metaphor be termed
floating bridges, have been established between Belfast and Glasgow, and
Dublin and Liverpool--does any one suppose, that if no artificial
obstacles be thrown in the way of emigration, or if no efforts be made
to provide an outlet in some other quarter for the pauper population of
Ireland, we shall escape being overrun by it? It is not conceivable
that, with the existing means of intercourse, wages should continue to
be, at an average, 20_d_. per day in England, and only 4_d_. or 5_d_. in